Mercimek Ahmed

Mercimek Ahmed (Ottoman Turkish: Merjümek Ahmed ibn Ilyas; died after 1432) was an Ottoman author who flourished in the first third of the 15th century. He is principally known for translating the Persian Qabus-nama, written by the Ziyarid ruler Keikavus in 1082, into Old Ottoman. Mercimek's translation, which he completed in 1432, was simple, based on the spoken Turkish vernacular, and consisted of a mainly Turkish lexicon, but was written at a time when the Persianisation of Ottoman literature was underway. By the beginning of the 18th century, Mercimek's translation had come to be viewed as archaic and unsophisticated. As a result of 20th-century Turkish nationalist waves, which augmented the interest in the Turkic aspects of the Turkish language, his translation gained renewed appreciation.