Michael’s son Theophilos, crowned as co-emperor in…

Michael’s son Theophilos, crowned as co-emperor in 820, had shortly thereafter married a beauty, Theodora, chosen from a group of candidates.

Liberally educated by the scholar and ardent Iconoclast John Philoponus, Theophilos is also much influenced by the learned court of the famous Caliph Harun ar-Rashid of Baghdad, whose long rein had ended twenty years earlier.

On becoming sole emperor at sixteen upon the death of his father in October 829, he emulates Harun ar-Rashid by wandering about the capital informally, listening to his subjects' complaints.