Abu'l-Abbas Ismail ( fa, ابوالقاسم عباس اسماعیل), was an

Iranian Iranian may refer to: * Iran, a sovereign state * Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran * Iranian lan ...

statesman from the Mikalid family, who served the

Abbasids The Abbasid Caliphate ( or ; ar, الْخِلَافَةُ الْعَبَّاسِيَّة, ') was the third caliphate to succeed the Islamic prophet Muhammad. It was founded by a dynasty descended from Muhammad's uncle, Abbas ibn Abdul-Muttalib ...

, and later the

Samanids People Samanid Samanid Samanid The Samanid Empire ( fa, سامانیان, Sāmāniyān) also known as the Samanian Empire, Samanid dynasty, Samanid amirate, or simply as the Samanids) was a Persianate Sunni Muslim empire, of Iranian dehqan orig ...

. He was the son of

Abd-Allah Mikali Abd-Allah Mikali ( fa, عبد الله میکالی) was an Iranian statesman from the Mikalid family, who served the Saffarids, and later the Abbasids. Abd-Allah was the son of Muhammad ibn Mikal, a prominent Mikalid commander who served the Ta ...

, a powerful magnate of the

Saffarids The Saffarid dynasty ( fa, صفاریان, safaryan) was a Persianate dynasty of eastern Iranian origin that ruled over parts of Persia, Greater Khorasan, and eastern Makran from 861 to 1003. One of the first indigenous Persian dynasties to emerg ...

, and later the governor of

Ahvaz Ahvaz ( fa, اهواز, Ahvâz ) is a city in the southwest of Iran and the capital of Khuzestan province. Ahvaz's population is about 1,300,000 and its built-up area with the nearby town of Sheybani is home to 1,136,989 inhabitants. It is hom ...

under the Abbasids. When Abu'l-Abbas became old enough, he also began serving the Abbasids and later became the patron of his tutor, the poet

Ibn Duraid Abū Bakr Muhammad ibn al-Ḥasan ibn Duraid al-Azdī al-Baṣrī ad-Dawsī Al-Zahrani (), or Ibn Duraid () (c. 837-933 CE), a leading grammarian of Baṣrah, was described as "the most accomplished scholar, ablest philologer and first poet of t ...

. Abu'l-Abbas later moved to Nishapur, in his homeland

Khorasan Khorasan may refer to: * Greater Khorasan, a historical region which lies mostly in modern-day northern/northwestern Afghanistan, northeastern Iran, southern Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan * Khorasan Province, a pre-2004 province of Ira ...

, then under the control of the Iranian Samanids. In 958, he was appointed as the head of chancery by the ''

vizier A vizier (; ar, وزير, wazīr; fa, وزیر, vazīr), or wazir, is a high-ranking political advisor or minister in the near east. The Abbasid caliphs gave the title ''wazir'' to a minister formerly called ''katib'' (secretary), who was a ...

'' of the Samanid ruler Abd al-Malik I, Abu Ja'far 'Utbi. Abu'l-Abbas would keep this office until his death in 973. He had three sons; one named Abu Muhammad Abd-Allah, who would obtain the offices of his father, another one named Abu Ja'far Mikali, and the last one named Abu'l-Qasim Ali, a military officer who fought with the Byzantines and the

pagan Paganism (from classical Latin ''pāgānus'' "rural", "rustic", later "civilian") is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, or ethnic religions other than Judaism. ...

Turks Turk or Turks may refer to: Communities and ethnic groups * Turkic peoples, a collection of ethnic groups who speak Turkic languages * Turkish people, or the Turks, a Turkic ethnic group and nation * Turkish citizen, a citizen of the Republic ...

in their steppes.

Sources

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ismail, Abul-Abbas Mikalids 10th-century Iranian politicians 973 deaths 10th-century births Samanid officials