Mahmud Aziz Paşa
Profile summary
Highlights
Mahmud Aziz Paşa was born in 1841 according to the Hijri year 1257 and was one of the cavalry mirlivas who served in the Ottoman army for forty-seven years. Mirliva was a high military rank in the Ottoman organization, above miralay and below ferik, corresponding to the modern rank of brigadier general.
In the final stage of his military career, Mahmud Aziz Paşa served as a member of the Special Military Court of the Makâm-ı Seraskerî. The office of the Serasker held a central place in the administration of the Ottoman army, both before the Ministry of War and within the late military organization. The Dîvân-ı Harb-i Mahsus was one of the bodies functioning as a special council or court concerned with military justice and discipline.
His forty-seven years of military service make Mahmud Aziz Paşa a long-serving Ottoman officer who witnessed the reigns of Sultan Abdülaziz, Murad V and Abdülhamid II.
Mahmud Aziz Paşa died on 17 Rajab 1322, corresponding to 27 September 1904, and was buried in the Fatih Mosque Cemetery.
Mahmud Aziz Paşa’s gravestone bears the signature of Mehmed Rif‘at. This signature belongs to the calligrapher Mehmed Rif‘at Yazgan, known especially for gravestone inscriptions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Rıfat Yazgan is remembered as a calligrapher who earned his living by writing gravestone inscriptions and worked in celî script.
Epitaph
He is the Eternal. A Fatiha for the soul of Cavalry Brigadier General Mahmûd Azîz Paşa, member of the General Staff Special War Department, who rendered forty-seven years of fine service in sacred military duty as if shielding it with his life, and sacrificed his life in the course of his duty. Date of birth: 1841 / Date of death: 27 September 1904. Written by the calligrapher Mehmed Rifat.
A Fatiha for his/her soul