Tarsus (Cilicia)

Tarsus, in the Cilicia region of southern Turkey near the Mediterranean, was a frontier fortress-town (thaghr) on the border between the Abbasid caliphate and the Byzantine Empire, a base for the seasonal jihad campaigns and a gathering place for ascetics and warriors. The traditionist and ascetic Abd Allah ibn al-Mubarak (d. 797), famed for combining hadith scholarship with frontier devotion, died at Hit on the Euphrates after campaigning in this border zone.