al-Mada'in (Ctesiphon), who had settled in Azerbaijan. Crone takes this to mean that he was of Aramean origin. However, Dinawari, a contemporary of Babak, concludes and states that there is ample evidence to support that his father's true name was Mutahar, a descendant of Abu Muslim through his daughter, Fāṭema. C.E. Bosworth argues that more credence should be lent to this latter account, as other sources are hostile and are eager to propose lowly or otherwise less honorable origins for Babak. In the other sources, his name is variably given as Abdallah, Merdas, Matar, Amir ibn Abdallah, or Amir ibn Ahad, all which suggest that he was seemingly a Muslim. Likewise, Babak's father is also the subject of derogatory fabrication in Muslim sources. Masudi noted in his ″Murūj al-dhahab wa maʿādin al-jawāhir″: ″What seems to us to be true and proven is that Bābak was a son of Moṭahhar, the son of Abū Moslem's daughter Fāṭema, and that the Fāṭemīya group of the Khurramites took their name from this Fāṭema, not from Fāṭema the daughter of God's Prophet″. The original faith of Babak is uncertain; he was born with the Muslim name of al-Hasan, and his three brothers, Mu'awiya, Abdallah, and Ishaq, also had Muslim names. Having a Muslim name is not in itself proof of any religious beliefs, as it was not uncommon for people to have a Muslim name in order "to move freely in Muslim society by virtue of their high position in their own community, such as the Armenian princes" (Crone). According to Crone, who follows Al-Waqidi, Babak's parents were probably no more than landless villagers, but knew that Babak and his brothers' futures lay with the Arab warlords of Azerbaijan, and thus as a way of "adapting to the standards of new the world," raised them as Muslims. Early life During Babak's youth, his travelling father was killed near Sabalan. Till the age of twelve, Babak worked as a cowherd, and afterwards entered the service of an Arab warlord named Shibl ibn al-Muthanna al-Azdi in Sarab, where he worked as a groom and servant. The ghilman ("slaves") of Shibl taught Babak how to play the lute. Babak also learned to recite poetry, probably in the local Adhari dialect. According to the 11th-century writer Abu'l Ma'ali, Babak played the lute and sang songs for the locals whilst working as a fruit vendor in the village. Babak