Stranger than the Nights
Justin Marozzi admires Hugh Kennedy’s article from 2004, which offers a nuanced portrait of the great Abbasid caliph, Harun al Rashid, much-mythologised hero of The Arabian Nights.
Of the 37 Abbasid caliphs who held sway in Baghdad between 762 and 1258, one name eclipses all others. Harun al Rashid (r. 786-809) owes his fame above all to The Arabian Nights, a collection of fantastical Indian, Persian and Arab tales dating to the eighth and ninth centuries.
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