Yusuf Balasaguni

Yusuf Balasaguni
Yusuf Balasaguni
Date of Birth	1015
Place of Birth	Balasagun
Date of death	1070
Place of death	Kashgar
Occupation
Language of Works	Turkic, Arabic script

Yusuf Hass Hajib Balasaguni ( Arabic: يوسف خاص حاجب البلاساغوني ; circa 1015-1070) is an outstanding Turkic poet and thinker. He lived in the XI century in the state of Karakhanids , in the cities of Kashgar and Balasagun .

There are articles on Wikipedia about other people named Yusuf and Nisboy Balasaguni .

Content

Biography

Yusuf Balasaguni was born about 1015 in the city of Balasagun . His father was one of the prominent and wealthy people of that time. The young poet received his primary education in his hometown.

The teachings of Avicenna and al-Farabi , as well as the book “ Shah-name ” by Firdousi, influenced the poet’s work.

At the age of 54 years (in 1069-1070), Yusuf Balasaguni completed the poem “Kutadgu Bilig” (“Blessed Knowledge”), and then presented it to Hagan Arslan and was awarded the title “Hass Hadzhib”. Balasaguni wrote, as he himself called, in the Turkic language of the Karakhanid era. “Kutadgu Bilig” is the first work written in the language of Muslim Turks of the Muslim Renaissance and fully preserved in three late copies, as evidenced by the poet’s words at the beginning of the poem ^[1] :

Yes, Arabs and Tajiks have a lot of books,
And with our speech this is only the beginning.
Whoever is wise will appreciate this book with respect
Only he appreciates knowledge who has matured with intelligence ..

While Yusuf Balasaguni lived with Arabs and Tajiks, there were a lot of scientists and a lot of books as Yusuf Balasaguni wrote in his poems, studying Tajik books he became famous throughout the world as a poet, writer, thinker, philosopher, etc. . Many Turkic-speaking peoples can rightfully consider this work to be the source or the first masterpiece of their written literature of the Muslim era.

Yusuf died at the age of 55. He is buried in the southern part of the city of Kashgar (modern China ) in the Paypap area ^[2] .

The Grace of Knowledge Poem

The poem “Graceful Knowledge” is both a work of art and an ethical-didactic and political-philosophical treatise. The characters are allegorical images personifying justice (Kun-Togdy), happiness (Ai-Toldy), reason (Ogdulmish), contentment (Ogdurmish). The poem is built in the form of dialogues between the main characters.

The poem is written in the size of the mutakarib of the Arab system of versification of Aruz and is the first example of the use of Aruz in Turkic literature. The writing is a double Masnavi verse.

The first surviving version of the text, written in Uighur writing and found in the 15th century in the Afghan Herat , is stored in the Austrian National Library in Vienna . The second option, written in Arabic script , is stored in the Cairo National Library. The third option is found in the Uzbek Namangan .

The full text of “Blessed Knowledge” was first published in the USSR in 1983 under the guidance of Academician A. N. Kononov in the scientific and academic series of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR “ Literary Monuments ”.

Memory

In the capital of Kyrgyzstan, Bishkek, a monument to Yusuf Balasaguni is installed.
Kyrgyz National University named after Zhusup Balasagyn got its modern name in 2002.
A number of streets in Kyrgyzstan bears his name.
The image of Balasaguni is present on the banknote of the Kyrgyz national currency of 1000 soms . Also, the National Bank of Kyrgyzstan issued commemorative coins for the anniversary (1000 years since the birth) of the poet.
Streets in the cities of Uzbekistan Tashkent, Andijan, Samarkand bear the name Yusuf hos Hajiba.