Abdurrahman Hibri

Abdurrahman Hibri was an Ottoman historian, scholar and poet born at Edirne in Dhu al-Hijja 1012 AH, May 1604, and died there in 1069 AH / 1659.¹² He was the son of Habbazzâde Hasan Efendi, one of Edirne's noted müderrises, known by the nickname Salbaş, from which Hibri is also called Salbaşzâde.¹ The name Hibri itself he chose as a young man's pen name, as the German article records.² His fame rests on his Enîsü'l-müsâmirîn, a history of Edirne.¹

Hibri began his education at Edirne and continued it at Istanbul, then took the mülâzemet that qualified him to teach.¹ Afterwards he left Edirne only for his hajj of 1632, on which he wrote the Menâsik-i Mesâlik, and for a teaching year in 1046 AH / 1636–37 at the Oruç Paşa Medrese in nearby Didymoteicho.¹²

His first known post was the Emîr Kadı Medrese at Edirne; he then rose through the Oruç Paşa Medrese at Didymoteicho in 1046 AH, the İbrâhim Paşa Medrese three years later, the Sarâciye in Dhu al-Qa'da 1052 AH / February 1643, the Emîniye the same year, the Taşlık a year later, the Eskicami two years after that, the Üç Şerefeli in 1655 and finally the Edirne Dârülhadis in 1658.¹ The German article matches this progression in outline.²

His best-known work is the Enîsü'l-müsâmirîn, written in 1046 AH / 1636 on the history, buildings, topography and notables of Edirne; it was the subject of the doctoral thesis of Sevim İlgürel, the encyclopaedia entry's author.¹ He also wrote the Defter-i Ahbâr, a concise Ottoman history in six registers and a conclusion, fullest on the reigns of Murad IV and Ibrahim; histories of the conquests of Revan and Baghdad under Murad IV; the Hadâiku'l-cinân on literary conversation; the Menâsik-i Mesâlik on his hajj journey; and the Riyâzü'l-ârifîn on the Forty Hadith.¹ The German article describes the Enîs as a historical, topographical and biographical description of Edirne and its surroundings in fourteen chapters.²

Hibri died the year after taking the Dârülhadis post and was buried in his family's cemetery in Edirne's Yıldırım quarter.¹ His tombstone carries only the year 1069 AH, spanning 1658–1659: the encyclopaedia entry computes 1659, while the German article gives "1658 or 1659".¹² The entry also shows how Şeyhî's Vekāyiu'l-fuzalâ confused Hibri's posts with those of Abdülkadir Efendi — the entry calls him Hibri's brother, the German article his paternal uncle — so that some researchers wrongly took Abdülkadir's death year, 1087 AH / 1676, for Hibri's own.¹²