After the victory, the triumphant Ottomans had 19 dead while the Hungarians lost 64 men. They buried their “martyrs”, and Deli Mehmed was also buried holding his head under his armpit. Then, the Khad saw a wonderful light coming from the sky above the tomb of the fallen hero. The poem is finished with Deli hüszrev’s prayer who was asking Allah to allow him to fall also in a heroic fight like this and to win the heavenly crown of the martyrs. He added that this miracle should encourage everybody:  „ilȃhî qîl tebeddül eyle hȃle, hemȃn terġîb içün yazdum maqȃle.”

It was the contemporary historian, the famous Dzselálzáde Musztafa who recorded the poem. Relying on his writing, later Ibrahim Pecsevi told the event as well, adding that the Khadi (judge) of Görösgál had written an epic poem in which he shared his experiences with us, and his text was about listing the miraculous deeds of the Warriors of the Faith. Now, we have only fragments of it. Szerecz Miklós quotes:

“Içinde baş kâfir begine
Qaraçin d?rler idi ol la ine”

“The cursed one, the Bey of the infidels,
Who was their leader, was called Kerecsényi”

 Even Evlia Cselebi, the great traveler and historian mentions in his 7th book that he had paid a visit to Görösgál in 1664 (Seyâhatnâme VII. Istanbul, 1928, pp. 48-49). He says that there was a cemetery half-mile away from Görösgál where Deli Mehmed was buried, the one who had several legends about his person. He writes the legend as follows:

“…the cemetery of the Garazsgál castle, that formerly was known as the pilgrimage site of Deli Mehmed. There are several stories about this Deli Mehmed but I am going to write down just one of them. The infidels besieged the castle. Deli Mehmed had the gate opened and attacked the enemy. Other Muslim warriors ran out and they were formidably destroying the foe. In the meanwhile, Deli Mehmed died the martyrs’ death, and an infidel beheaded him. When one of his friends, Deli Hüszrem saw that Mehmed was lying without his head, he said: –Hey, you valiant warrior! You have fallen victim on such a day like this, for the glory of God! It is not an honorable thing to lie around here while the enemy is carrying away your head!– When he said so, the beheaded torso of Deli Mehmed, for God’s command rose and began to chase the infidel who had cut his head off. He raised his right hand and delivered such a blow at him that the head of the infidel split into shatters. Then, Deli Mehmed rushed among the infidels and killed everyone who tried to oppose him. Seeing this, the foe was running headlong away but nobody could flee him. In the battle, Deli Hüszrem also died. Deli Mehmed went to him, he took him on his lap and they remained so. They are still resting together like that, may Allah give them eternal mercy. As the event has taken place just recently, the old men who witnessed it are still alive. I’ve recorded it as I heard it from them.”

Szerecz Miklós notes that he has a friend who is also a historian and reenactor like him, the leader of the Szigetvár Castle Museum, Lebedy János. He has many times examined the area of the assumed site of Görösgál castle. It was published in 2008 “Nemeske és Görösgal várai” by Lebedy János. According to Lebedy, the memory of Görösgál’s heroes is still traceable in Turkish books, like in the work of the famous realist writer, Ömer Seyfeddin who wrote a short story in the first part of the 20th century. Its title is: “A heroic dead who hasn’t let his head go”. This writing was re-published in 1977 in Hungary by the “Szigetvári Várbaráti Kör” (Circle of Friends of Szigetvár Castle). Seyfeddin’s story is told from the viewpoint of the Khadi, the eye-witness of the battle of 1555. 

The so-called „cehalophoria” aka head-taking is a well-known motif of Christian legends that occurs in the legend of Saint Dénes (Denis) as well. The question is arising: how did this get adopted by the Muslim tradition?

There is no doubt, that this short epic poem (“desztán”) is one of the most precious pieces of Ottoman folklore that survived in Hungary in the 16th century. However, there is no information about how much it might have been known among the Ottomans in Hungary. As Ibrahim Pecsevi has heard about it, it must have been quite known, though. Yet, it is exciting to peep into the list of mercenaries of the contemporary Ottoman garrisons of the area. You can read about the ethnic situation here:

https://www.hungarianottomanwars.com/essays/who-were-the-turks/

We can see that in the smaller palisades, just like in Görösgál, there served many Marauders and irregular soldiers. We can see the same in Pécs castle, too. As it was close to Szigetvár Castle, there were more than 800 soldiers there in 1547. Many of them were south-Slavic Marauders, their names are known from a list from 1555: like Szeroda Bogdan Radics, Vuk Acsanko, Sztoján Vuk, Vukman Radoszláv, Nikola Milos, etc. On the other hand, the officers of the elite units (Janissaries and Sipahies) had Turkish names as we can see from another list of Timarian landowners of Pécs from the 1570s: Hasszán bin Ferhad, Hüsszein Ali, Yuszuf Abdullah, Iszkander Ahmed, Kurd Mehemed, Musztafa Turszun, etc.

 

Source: Szerecz Miklós: http://szigethvar.hu/var/1555-v%C3%A9gvid%C3%A9k-v%C3%A9rtan%C3%BAi

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