Fadl ibn Naubakht was the son of Naubakht Ahvazi, the famous Zoroastrian who designed the city of Baghdad. Fadl converted to Islam and worked as a Chief Librarian to Caliph Harun al Rashid at his House of Wisdom. The House of Wisdom was based on Sassanian libraries. Many important Greek and Persian works were translated into Arabic there.

This 13th century drawing by Yahya Ibn Vaseti shows a group of scholars studying in an academic library similar to the House of Wisdom. One of the scholars who worked at the House of Wisdom was Khawrazmi, the great Persian mathematician, who is known as the father of algebra.