ALiterary workIndependent states
Navoi's Khamsa
Five poems written in 1483–1485 — the first complete Khamsa in Turkic and a response to Nizami Ganjavi.
The Khamsa ("quintet") tradition was founded by the Azerbaijani poet Nizami Ganjavi and answered in Persian by poets such as Amir Khusrau and Jami; Navoi was the first to create a complete Khamsa in Turkic.
It consists of Hayrat ul-Abrar (1483), Farhad and Shirin, Layli and Majnun, Sab'ai Sayyar (1484) and Saddi Iskandari (1485). Navoi reworked the famous stories — in Farhad and Shirin, for example, the hero is not the shah but the craftsman-hero Farhad.
The work proved that Turkic could produce great poetry and influenced the literature of the whole Turkic world; its manuscripts are kept in major libraries around the world.
Sources
Updated: October 3, 2026