Name: Abdulhayy Mahmud Hata'i
Age: 56
Gender: Male
Birthplace: Constantinople
Religious Affiliation: Muslim
Secular Affiliation: None
Level of education: Few men are as well-read as Hata'i, having excellent knowledge of all matters scientific and religious.
Social status: Being a somewhat well known theologian, translator and scholar, Hata'i often receives immediate respect in Muslim circles, however, stories of him being a heretic also run around and treatment may change from person to person. He's also well known in amongst scholars for his translations, in the Zaphorozian lands for slaying a giant serpent, not to mention that he has friends in the philosophical circles of the Netherlands.
Occupation: Formerly a scholar and a translator, Hata'i is a semi-famous traveler (most of his fame due to his many former occupations), who lives off what he can gain from the people and things he's gathered in the wilds.
Appearance: An incredibly tall and somewhat pudgy man, Hata'i, while somehow not looking the part at first sight, can be quite creepy to an erudite observer. His arms are comically disproportionate, reaching almost beyond his knees, not to mention his giraffe-like, long neck, almost completely covered by his rather oddly shaped beard. His face is, possibly to further confuse any possible onlooker, perfectly fine and normal, with a round head, green eyes with pupils that somewhat resemble that of a goat, and skin free of wrinkles, creating a somewhat childlike appearance. His legs are thin, and when bare, look like they'd barely support his weighty, fat-covered, large round torso. With all of these joined together, Hata'i wouldn't look out of place in a horror story - but somehow, nobody that's met him has had any questions about his unnatural appearance. His skin is thick and light, with a yellow hue.
On his head is a simple, salmon colored skullcap gored into two, its sides covered with a green cloth band that leaves only the top part open, with a small, decorated button on top of the crown. His clothing consists of knee-high leather boots, with baggy breeches tucked inside the boots, a white shirt, a mail-lined kazaghand coat, a large, green padded robe, a leather buffcoat, and a red sash on top of it all. He has an axe slung around his shoulder along with a bag, a bandolier wrapped around his torso, a miquelet carbine tucked in his sash alongside a sabre, and a blowing horn hanging from his neck alongside various medallions. However, he prefers to hide in local attire while traveling, wearing them over his usual clothing.
Personality: Hata'i isn't your stereotypical fat, strong, hale and hearty boisterous bruiser - while he can get hotheaded, he's mostly a calm, quiet man who keeps to himself. While he's not introverted, it'd be wrong to also call him extroverted. He listens to all opinions and respects them as long as the opposition can raise a successful argument, and prefers diplomacy over violence. He can, however, get up close and personal once he feels cruelty and oppression. While he always accepts a cry of mercy, he will not stand by while there is tyranny. Even though he does not approve of certain traits like vanity, he does not like voicing his opinions and creating friction amongst people. Still, when asked about something, he always answers sincerely and sometimes bluntly, sometimes leading him to trouble.
Skill set: Hata'i is well versed in survival in the wilds, and is a quite durable laborer, but his expertise lies in his incredible knowledge of religions and the Unknown. In towns he resides he spends his time reading, laboring for food, and making charms for people who'd rather have something to cling to. He also has some experience in fighting, having fought in the Ottoman-Safavid war as part of the Sultan's cavalry retinue.
Languages: Hata'i is a proper polyglot, being able to speak Turkish, Arabic, Persian, Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Latin, Greek, Italian, French, Russian and German to varying effectiveness.
Bio: Born in 1610 as the son of a Qadi, Hata'i (then just known as Abdulhayy Mahmud) had his future outlined pretty nicely from birth. Born during a rather tumultuous time of the Empire, his father was a Qadi during the reign of Osman II the Young, a devout follower of the Sultan on his actions against the Janissaries. However, after Osman II was overthrown by the Janissaries, his father also lost the position of Qadi, and a resentment started to grow within the man. His resentment took the form of religious extremism, for the Janissary Order was tied to the Bektashi Sufi Order, a rather unorthodox sect, not to mention that the Theologians who had a part in the rebellion were people who often spoke respectfully of controversial figures such as Ibn Arabi. The man came to think that only heretics could act so boldly against the Sultan and spill his blood, and thus, these people, and those they respected, had to be heretics. Finding himself a part of the newly-rising fundamentalist Kadızadeli movement, Abdulhayy Mahmud's father spent his time preaching on heretics and taking care of his son's education. The man eventually regained his position of Qadi during the reign of Murad IV, and used his regained position to improve his son Abdulhayy Mahmud's education. As a young man, Abdulhayy Mahmud took lessons in almost all of the Islamic subjects, eventually proving to be an excellent learner. After earning his father's approval, he went to Egypt and Mecca for further learning, in 1628. Returning to Constantinople in 1632 upon his father's death, he was taken in to the retinue of a Pasha, earning a valuable source of income and opportunities. Abdulhayy Mahmud used this position to crack down on unorthodoxy while also expanding his influence to court, increasing his knowledge of the Unknown in the meanwhile. After earning the Sultan Murad IV's favor by using the 'Elite Science', the one about the Djinn, to partially cure Murad IV's brother Ibrahim's mental illnesses, he was given the position of Royal Polymath, essentially becoming a companion of the Sultan. He was present alongside the Sultan during his campaigns against the Safavids, and was amongst those who tried to cure him of gout on his deathbed.
Upon Murad IV's death, he found himself in palace intrigue, immediately becoming disgusted with it. He fell more and more into his studies and spending time with his friend, the scholar Katip Çelebi. After earning the hatred of the charlatan Hussein Effendi, who was kept around by the deranged Sultan thanks to his claims of speaking with Djinni, he bid Katip Çelebi farewell and left for Caucasia alongside the explorer Evliya Çelebi. Earning his respect with his knowledge of interesting matters, the two soon became friends and were present during the rather unsuccessful siege of Azaq. Soon after, however, Abdulhayy Mahmud realized he couldn't escape Hussein Effendi's grasp, as a letter was brought to him from apparently the Sultan himself, ordering him to leave for Northern Crimea, near the Dnieper, to slay a monster terrorizing the populace. He was strictly ordered to go by himself, as the letter said that 'only he had the capability to fight a being of the Unknown'. Abdulhayy Mahmud knew that this was not written by the Sultan himself, as he was, most of the time, mentally disabled. But, to decline this order was to accept his doom, and death in the Zaporozhian lands sounded better than to receive treatment from the famous executioner Kara Ali. After bidding his friend Evliya Çelebi farewell, he, alongside a courier that would leave for Constantinople once Abdulhayy Mahmud had a confirmed location on the creature's whereabouts, set out to the lands of Zaporozhje, on a horse gifted to him by the Crimean Khan, armed with a simple mail-lined coat, a carbine and a saber. Staying away from groups of people and pretending to be one of the local populace by removing his turban, Abdulhayy Mahmud followed the rumors of the monster to a small island on the Dnieper. Moving to the island on a chaika along with a group of brave Cossacks, he managed to ambush the monster, which was revealed to be a dragon-like creature, with the head of a deer, about the size of a very large elephant. After emptying their guns on the dragon (considering that these guns all had one shot each, it wouldn't be hard to say it didn't do much to the creature), Abdulhayy Mahmud and the Cossacks rushed at the dragon, sabers in hand.
Before anyone could get in reach, the creature opened its mouth and shouted and flapped its wings, and a burst of lightning charred everyone but Abdulhayy Mahmud. Somehow unhurt, Abdulhayy Mahmud swung his sword at the dragon's neck, opening a large wound that started bleeding profusely, and also breaking the sword. Throwing itself on its back, started speaking. It spoke of how it was an avatar of the Sazakhan, dragon of thunder and lightning, and how Abdulhayy Mahmud had damaged the Divine Balance by attempting to kill it. The creature then cursed Abdulhayy Mahmud in its dying breath, a punishment for his disrespect. Abdulhayy Mahmud was then promptly warped into a mess. After a while, the Cossacks waiting for them found the dead creature, the charred Cossacks, and the inhumanly shaped Abdulhayy Mahmud, paralyzed and shaped physically unable to move. While the villagers contemplated burying him, one realized that his eyes were still moving, and they took him back to the village, out of sheer gratitude. After a few weeks, he was suddenly taken from the house in which he was put by a group of Tatars and hastily put on a horse. He assumed that they were the men of Hussein Effendi, taking him to Azaq so they could cut his head off, salt it, put it in honey, and send it back to the Palace. Oddly enough, he arrived at Perekop, with Evliya Çelebi waiting for him there. Evliya Çelebi told Abdulhayy Mahmud that he had questioned the courier, bribed him to say that Abdulhayy Mahmud was dead, and hired some Tatars to find Abdulhayy Mahmud before men of the Porte wanted to make sure. He was taken to a dervish, who told him that only a Sheikh could cure him of his problem. After going to Bakchysaray, Evliya Çelebi gave him one of his slaves to act as companion on his voyage back to Constantinople.
The ship got cleaved in half during a storm in the middle of the Black Sea, and Abdulhayy Mahmud, out of pure chance, found himself in a barrel, which floated as the waves wanted. After a few days, Abdulhayy Mahmud found himself on the coasts of Trebizond, saved by fishermen. Realizing that Abdulhayy Mahmud's illness wasn't of a physical nature, the fishermen from Trebizond decided to make him companion for the dervishes visiting a Shaykh in Anatolia. After spending a weeks' journey in a wheelcart, he was brought to the Bayrami Shaykh, who cured him of his condition through a hard slap in the face. Eternally grateful, Abdulhayy Mahmud left his old life and became a Bayrami Dervish himself. Now calling himself Hata'i, 'one who has mistaken', he spent 9 years of his life as part of the Order, woodcutting, fishing, and hunting for the populace, meanwhile redefining his opinion of Islam through Sufism. Believing himself to be reborn, and wanting to undo his mistakes, Hata'i bid farewell to the dervishes and the Saint, and left for Constantinople once more, with not much more than how he came to the Order. The year was 1651, Hussein Effendi having been executed during a revolt against Sultan Ibrahim 3 years ago. The news of him being alive quickly reached court, and by the time he actually got through the city gates, there were guards and aghas to celebrate his homecoming. He was also given a letter by the Vizier through courier, which said that he still was one of the Royal Polymaths. He did not refuse the position, hoping that, through his position, he could perhaps change some things in the State for the better.
Things didn't go as expected for him, however, as the court was now more corrupt than even before, with everyone hoping to use the 10 year old Sultan for their own gain. Realizing that he was not in position to do anything, he quit from the position of Royal Polymath and retreated to his abandoned house, bought by Katip Çelebi years ago after his supposed death. From the house he wrote declarations, poems, and manuscripts on what the State needed to do in order to stay close to the essence of Islam. He also went from mosque to mosque, preaching about abandoning superstitions and focusing more on love, instead of hate. His teachings quickly gained followers, and with them, Hata'i created a fund for the poor folk of Constantinople. This act boomed his popularity even more, and after earning the approval of a Rifa'i Sheikh, got his name spoken in the Sufi Orders as well. After regaining popularity, he was sent a letter by the Vizier once more, and was given the rank of Professor. He accepted, and extended his teachings amongst the academic circles of the Ottoman Empire, working with Katip Çelebi to theorize improvements for the Empire, not to mention working on the sciences, and criticizing current policies. However, fellow academicians started to envy his newly found popularity and his rather blunt tongue, and he was framed of heresy after his positive comments about Sheikh Bedreddin, a man who had rebelled against the Ottoman Empire two centuries ago. After a trial that was extensively modified through bribery, Hata'i was indeed found guilty of Heresy, and, while about to be executed by the hand of Kara Ali, the punishment was changed to house arrest and exile to the island of Crete, out of respect for his past deeds, and the public belief that he too possessed saintly qualities, a belief that had spread after his act of (supposedly) slaying the Sazakhan. It was the year 1653.
At Crete, he was locked in a Greek style two-story house at the edge of a cliff, guarded by a group of Janissaries. At the house, there was not much to do except pray and plan an escape. After a few months of waiting, and befriending and mentoring the guards, he eventually hosted a feast for them during Ramadan, and openly voiced his intentions to leave. At that point, the Janissaries viewed Hata'i as a figure of authority, not to mention their immense respect. He was freely allowed to leave, with the Janissaries writing off a death by flu as his. This was the second time that he was assumed dead by the State. Hata'i grabbed all things of value, and got on a ship headed to Venice. At Venice, he spent two weeks learning the Italian language, after which he started wandering from village to village, pretending to be a monk, helping in menial tasks in exchange of food and taking care of any problems the people were afraid of. After killing a giant bear in Turin, and hunting down 'a demon' in Milan, he started attracting unwanted attention from authorities, which caused him to escape to Zurich. Preaching about 'a Way of Hope' during an unstable time which Christendom was recently recovering from, he was able to get away with it without any lasting problems for a while. Buying himself a horse at a village north of Zurich, he started a journey through Germany, going from town to town, helping with labor and menaces, making speeches, and occasionally arming the populace against bandits, marauders and cruel rulers, leading them personally more than often. Nonetheless, rumors of a man riling up the peasantry and causing uprising reached the Habsburg Court, and bounty hunters started to hunt 'a tall, demonic enemy of the Catholic Church and a foe of the State'. Learning of this, he took on the guise of a bounty hunter from Graz, and rode his horse to the Dutch Republic, where he was able to assume a new identity as a translator. He was able to be informed of the news from his homeland through Ottoman traders, and after befriending them, entered trade himself, but quit soon after, believing the job to be unfit for his personality (a viewer with a keen eye may spot him in the Johannes Lingelbach's Dam Square painting). In 1657, he learned of his friend Katip Çelebi's death from one of the traders, and in his friend's memory, started translating Latin books to Ottoman, while translating Ottoman works to Latin. During this time, he met and befriended a young Baruch Spinoza, playing an extensive part in his philosophy through his translations (and possibly being one of the reasons for his expulsion from the Dutch Jewish Community), and also became an acquaintance with Rembrandt (who actually made a painting of Hata'i, but unfortunately, the painting was lost in time). After traveling alongside Spinoza for some time after his expulsion, he moved to Rotterdam in 1662.
In 1663, he met with his old friend Evliya Çelebi out of coincidence in Rotterdam, who was still wandering the earth despite his age. Talking to Evliya Çelebi, he learned that he was still traveling, and writing down his memoirs about the lands and the marvels of God. Moved by his example, Hata'i remembered the life of the dervish he had left behind. Here, in the Dutch Republic, he was no longer the traveler he was, but merely a translator. He had riches, thanks to his short stint in trade, but he had lost the true riches in his life. He had given up wandering - yet his friend was still walking the earth, learning more about it, reaffirming his awe of God. In 1664, he sent a farewell letter to his friend Spinoza, containing a bill that left all his wealth in the Dutch Republic to the young man, and left for what he did best in life, which was traveling, preaching and helping. He traveled to Spain through France, becoming a thorn in the side of local authorities once more. As expected, he attracted attention he did not want (and probably nobody would want), and after taking up new identities and shedding them over and over through a span of 2 years dotting through French and Spanish borders hoping to lose attention, he decided to go to Portugal, and through there, the New World. His plan was working quite well, with him pretending to be a trader from the Dutch Republic, resting in the town of Sintra.
Then he woke up in a pile of ash.
Notes: Is excellent at coming up with new identities for himself (complete with backstories), and can learn a language within a few weeks.
