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Haroun al-Rashid : Arabic härōōn-äl-räshëd means Aaron the Just. Born at Reyy near Tehran, in 766, he was the third son of the third Abbasid caliph, Mohammed al-Mahdi (ruled 775-85), who entrusted his education to Yaḥyā ibn Khālid, at one time Governor of Arminiya. When Haroun was sixteen he was name second heir after his elder brother, Musa al-Hādi. Yaḥyā continued to advise him when he was named the leader of military expeditions against Byzantium (q.v.) in 780 & 782; the second invasion even reached the Bosporus. Haroun was rewarded by being named governor of Ifriqiyah (Tunisia), Egypt, Syria, Armenia, & Azerbaijan Province in Iran, & the honorific äl-räshëd, the Upright, was added to his name. In September 786, Al-Rashid succeeded his brother Al-Hādi & became the fifth Caliph. His rule coincided with the Islamic Golden Age marked by scientific, cultural, & religious prosperity, as well as Islamic art & music, & Baghdad flourished as a centre of knowledge, culture & trade. In 797 the Byzantine empress Irene made peace & agreed to pay a large sum of money. Irene’s successor, the emperor Nicephorus denounced that treaty but Rashid defeated him in 803 & again in 806, forcing him to make an even more humiliating treaty, which required paying annual tribute to Baghdad. But by 803, Rashid was finding it difficult to hold his vast empire together. Syria (Al Sham) was inhabited by tribes with Umayyad sympathies & remained the bitter enemy of the Abbasids, while Egypt witnessed uprisings against Abbasids due to maladministration & arbitrary taxation. The Umayyads had been established in Spain in 755, the Idrisids in Morocco in 788 & the Aghlabids in Ifriqiyah (now Tunisia) in 800. Besides, unrest flared up in Yemen, & the Kharijites rose in rebellion in Daylam, Kerman, Fars, & Sistan. Revolts also broke out in Greater Khorasan, & al-Rashid waged many campaigns against the Byzantines. Some of the Twelver sect of Shia Muslims blames Harun for his supposed role in the murder of their 7th Imam (Musa ibn Ja'far)…. Very soon it became clear that by dividing the empire between his two sons, Rashid had provided them with sufficient resources to become independent of each other. After his death in 809, a war (the Fourth Fitna) broke out between his two sons, Al-Amin & Al-Ma’mun, which spiralled into a prolonged period of turmoil & warfare throughout the Caliphate, ending only with Ma’mun’s final triumph in 827.