Amasya (northern Anatolia)

Amasya is a town in northern Anatolia and the capital of a wilayet. It keeps the name Amaseia, by which it was known in antiquity. ¹

In 712 the Arabs held it for a short time. In the 11th century it came under the Danishmendids, and Kilij Arslan II of the Rum Seljuks annexed it with their other territories. At the division of his kingdom among his sons in 588/1193 it fell to Nizam al-Din Arghun Shah, but his brother Rukn al-Din Sulayman seized it. It was later under Mongol governors, and in 742/1341 Habil-oghlu occupied it, before it passed to Eretna and his successors. Later Hajji Shadgeldi, Malik Ahmad, Qadi Burhan al-Din, the Ottoman Bayezid I and, after Timur's capture of Bayezid, Mehmed Celebi, who fled there to start his campaign against his brothers. ²

Under the Ottomans Amasya enjoyed the special favour of the ruling house: Bayezid II was governor there as crown prince, and Suleyman I often stayed there and received the Austrian ambassador Busbecq. It had been a cultural centre already in the Seljuk period and became one of the main seats of learning in Anatolia. Evliya Celebi and Katib Celebi describe it in the 17th century. ³

Amasya lies on the Samsun-Sivas-Kharput road and was an important transit centre by the end of the 19th century; the Samsun-Sivas railway was completed in 1930. It has orchards along the Yesil Irmak. Its monuments include the Burmali Minare, originally a Seljuk foundation; the Gok Medrese, built in 665/1266-7; the Ottoman mosques of Bayezid Pasha (812/1419), Yurguc Pasha (834/1430), Sultan Bayezid (891/1486) and Mehmed Pasha (891/1486); the old fortress, of Hellenistic origin; and the tombs of Khalifet Ghazi (622/1225) and Turumtay (677/1278). The monuments suffered from the earthquakes of 1734, 1825 and 1939. ⁴