Abstract:

Epics have an important place in Turkish history, Turkish culture and Turkish folk literature, and the roots of the Turkish epic tradition go back to the early periods of history. Dede Korkut Epics; it has an important place in Turkic epics; it is a reflection of ancient Turkic life; it contains important information about Turkic history, geography, language, literature, culture, art and many more. Many people are mentioned in Dede Korkut. One of them is Bayindir Han. The name of Bayindir Han is mentioned in nine epics in The Book of Dede Korkut. In the Book of Dede Korkut, mostly the historical and symbolical personality of Bayindir Han is dominant and its legendary-mythological roots are weak. The memories of Oguz Han’s reign are partially reflected in the Bayindir Han type in Dede Korkut. There are many historical-epic-legendary-mythological layers in the type of Bayindir Han, who has an important place in Dede Korkut and is the highest ruler in the epic. An important historical layer of the Bayindir Han type in Dede Korkut is related to Bilge Kagan (716-734), the ruler of the 2nd (Eastern) Gok-Turk State. It is seen that Bayindir Han took and active role in the Turkmenistan variant, in which the Salur tribes had an important place, away from the Akkoyunlu influence. This shows that Bayindir Han, just like Salur Kazan, has exiested in Dede Korkut for a long time. It is also seen that the personalities of Bayindir Han and Salur Kazan ara mixed in some epics in Dede Korkut. In this article, Bayindir Han in Dede Korkut; his name, family, place in history, Dede Korkut and epics were examined.