Çelebi (title)

Çelebi was an Ottoman title of respect, approximately corresponding to "gentleman", "well-mannered" or "courteous". Çelebi also means “man of God”, as an i-suffixed derivative from çalab, which means "God" in old Turkish. German linguist and Turkologist Marcel Erdal, citing Baron Tiesenhausen, traces çalab back to Arabic djellaba "importer, trader, merchant" > "high social positions"; jallāb is derived from root j-l-b "to have brought, to import", ultimately from West Semitic root g-l-b "to catch, to fetch".

Notable people with the title include:


 * The sons of Ottoman sultan Bayezid I, who fought one another for the throne in the Ottoman Interregnum of 1402 to 1413:
 * İsa Çelebi (1380–1406)
 * Musa Çelebi (died 1413)
 * Mehmed Çelebi (1390–1421), who won the civil war, being crowned sultan Mehmed I
 * Mustafa Çelebi (1393–1422)
 * Süleyman Çelebi (1377–1411)
 * Ali Çelebi: see Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi
 * Anton Çelebi (1604–1674), Armenian merchant magnate, Ottoman and Tuscan official
 * Aşık Çelebi (1520–1572), Ottoman poet and biographer
 * Çelebi, family of descendants of Rumi (13th-century Persian poet and Sufi mystic), who established and led the Sufi Mevlevi Order ("the whirling dervishes") for 800 years
 * Evliya Çelebi (1611–1682), Ottoman traveler
 * Gazi Çelebi, 14th-century Turkish pirate and ruler of Sinop
 * Hezârfen Ahmed Çelebi, alleged 17th-century Ottoman aviator, brother of Lagâri Hasan Çelebi
 * Hoca Çelebi (1490–1574), Ottoman Grand Mufti
 * Katip Çelebi (1609–1657), Ḥājjī Khalīfa, Ottoman polymath and encyclopaedist.

Other
 * Eremya Çelebi Kömürciyan (1637-1695), Ottoman Armenian traveller.
 * Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi (1510/11?–1572), Ottoman jurist and writer.
 * Kinalizâde Fehmi Çelebi (1564–1596), Ottoman poet, son of Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi.
 * Kınalızâde Hasan Çelebi (1546-1604), Ottoman poet and bibliographer, son of Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi.
 * Lagâri Hasan Çelebi, alleged 17th-century Ottoman aviator, brother of Hezârfen Ahmed.
 * Nişancı Tâcı-Zâde Câ’fer Çelebi (Nishandji Tadji-zade Dja'fer Çelebi; 1459-1515), 16th-century Ottoman statesman and a diwan poet
 * Seydi Ali Reis (1498–1563), or Sidi Ali Ben Hossein, an Ottoman admiral and nautical writer.
 * Suzi Çelebi of Prizren (died 1524), Ottoman epic poet.
 * Yirmisekiz Mehmed Çelebi (died 1732), Ottoman statesman.


 * Âmil Çelebioğlu (1934–1990), Turkish researcher and professor