Correspondence between Leo III and Umar II

The Correspondence between Leo III and Umar II is a polemical exchange attributed to the Byzantine emperor Leo III and the Umayyad caliph Umar II, in which each ruler attempts to persuade the other to convert to his own faith. Modern scholars regard the surviving texts as a later pious fiction composed by anonymous authors rather than genuine letters exchanged by the two rulers, since the earliest surviving version appears in an Armenian chronicle written around 788 to 789, decades after both men had died. The correspondence survives in six main versions across Latin, Armenian, Arabic and Aljamiado, grouped into three textual families, and it addresses recurring points of Christian-Muslim debate such as the reliability of scripture, the nature of Christ, and the identity of the Paraclete. Its long transmission and repeated adaptation across centuries illustrate how Mediterranean communities reused this dialogue for their own polemical purposes.