730

Emperor Xuan Zong (Li Longji) (685–762)

Year 730 (DCCXXX) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 730 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

King Liutprand contracts an alliance with Eutychius, exarch of Ravenna, and agrees to support him in his attack on Rome, while subjugating the independent southern Lombard duchies of Benevento and Spoleto.
Tiberius Petasius proclaims himself emperor in Tuscia. Eutychius defeats him with the support of Pope Gregory II, and Tiberius is killed in Monterano, with his head sent to the Byzantine emperor Leo III as a gift.^[1]
Charles Martel defeats the last independent dukedom of Alamannia, and incorporates it into the Frankish Empire. He also launches raids on the Saxons beyond the Rhine.

September–October – Umayyad forces sack the Byzantine fortress of Charsianon in central Anatolia (modern Turkey), which remains a contested stronghold during the next century of Byzantine–Arab warfare.^[2]
December 9 – Battle of Marj Ardabil: The Khazars under Barjik invade the provinces of Jibal and Adharybaydjian. He defeats an Umayyad army (25,000 men) at Ardabil (Iran), killing al-Jarrah ibn Abdallah.

Emperor Xuan Zong has four palace walls in the northeast sector of the capital city Chang'an dismantled and reassembled to construct a new Daoist abbey, the grounds of which are formally a large garden for the Bureau of Agriculture.

In this decade hops are first cultivated in Germany, in the Hallertau region.^[3]

Leo III of the Byzantine Empire orders the destruction of all icons, beginning the First Iconoclastic Period. Many monks flee to Greece and Italy (taking smaller icons with them, hidden in their clothing); others flee to the caves of the Cappadocian desert.