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Abdallah, the future al-Ma'mun, was born in Baghdad on the night of the 13 to 14 September 786 CE to Harun al-Rashid and his concubine Marajil, from Badghis.On the same night, which later became known as the "night of the three caliphs", his uncle al-Hadi died and was succeeded by Ma'mun's father, Harun al-Rashid, as ruler of the Abbasid Caliphate. [1]
In 811, al-Amin's troops marched against Khurasan, but al-Ma'mun's general Tahir ibn Husayn defeated them in the Battle of Ray, and then invaded Iraq and besieged Baghdad itself. The city fell after a year, al-Amin was executed, and al-Ma'mun became Caliph. Al-Ma'mun chose to remain in Khurasan, however, rather than coming to the capital.
He is perhaps the most famous of the Tahirids. His career spanned twenty-five years under three caliphs, al-Ma'mun, al-Mu'tasim, and al-Wathiq. Militarily, he is known for defeating the powerful rebels Nasr ibn Shabath in the Jazira (Upper Mesopotamia) and Ubaydallah ibn al-Sari in Egypt. Map of the Tahirid Khurasan
Al-Amin's army (divided by the numerous tribes within it) was led by Ali ibn Isa ibn Mahan, the former governor of Khurasan, who had been ousted by Harun.Al-Ma'mun's army was led by Tahir ibn Husayn, a Persian noble with some claim to one of the many mountain principalities which were nominally vassals to the caliphate.
When Ali ibn Isa set out for Khurasan, he reportedly took along a set of silver chains with which to bind al-Ma'mun and carry him back to Baghdad. [4] [5] The news of Ali's approach threw Khurasan into panic, and even al-Ma'mun considered fleeing. The only military force available to him was a small army of some 4,000–5,000 men, under Tahir.
Harun's eldest son al-Amin is named heir, but his second son Abdallah al-Ma'mun is named as al-Amin's heir, and governor of Khurasan. A third son, al-Qasim, is added as third heir, and receives responsibility over the frontier areas with the Byzantine empire. 803: Downfall of the Barmakids. Execution of Ja'far ibn Yahya.
For his support of al-Ma'mun in the Fourth Fitna, he was granted the governance of Khorasan. The Tahirids, however, were not an independent dynasty—according to Hugh Kennedy: "The Tahirids are sometimes considered as the first independent Iranian dynasty, but such a view is misleading.
813–833), who had been given a large viceregal domain encompassing Khurasan, al-Amin entrusted Ali with the subduing al-Ma'mun and his followers. At the head of a huge army of reportedly 50,000 men drawn from the abna , Ali marched east, but in the Battle of Ray on 3 July 811 he was crushingly defeated and killed by a far smaller army of al ...