The shadow theatre spread from the Far East, and having first been recorded in Java, China and India, came to Turkey on its travels westward. There seems little doubt that the shadow play was borrowed from Java by the Arabs. Arab trading and raiding expeditions kept them in continuous contact with Java. Shadow theatre was borrowed by Turks from Egypt in sixteenth century.
The shadow theatre known in Turkey under the name of Karagoz appears to have enjoyed a lengthy history within the framework of the Ottoman Empire. If we may believe the oral tradition respectfully adhered to by the exhibitors, who as early as during the era of Evliya Celebi constituted a highly regarded guild, we must go back as far as the reign of Orhan (1326 – 1359) to trace, if not the origin of this spectacle, at least the birthdates of the two protagonists, Karagoz and Hacivad. According to this legend, Hacivad and Karagoz actually lived at that time in Bursa, the one a mason and the other a blacksmith. They even labored together; the story goes, in the building of a mosque begun on orders of the Sultan. However, our good friends, true to their roles of mirth-provoking companions, kept the other workmen from their tasks by their continuous flow of chaff and chatter…indeed, the story tells, so enthralled were the other workers with the pair’s irrepressible and continuous jesting that they would drop their tools and instruments and gather around them. This situation, which definitely delayed any progress on the mosque, finally came to the Sultan’s attention and the legend tells that when he was informed of what was going on he ordered the two culprits to be summarily executed. And so our merry pranksters met with an end which seems all the more dismal in contrast to their happy-go-lucky existence. In the meanwhile, however, Orhan was overcome with remorse and sincerely repented his undue harshness. According to the legend, one Sheikh Kusteri, wishing to console his master, erected a screen in a corner of the palace, where he showed silhouetted figures representing the two executed workmen, at the same time imitating their comic dialogue, for the delectation of the Sultan.
The legend even provides a delightful detail here: the first shadow-figures of Hacivad and Karagoz were simply and merely the babouches, or Turkish slippers, of this ingenious sheikh!
