Person
Rav Huna bar Nathan רב הונא בר נתן
a rich man in favour at the Persian court, Rav Ashi's senior colleague
The scene with the belt is in Zevachim 19a. Such passages are precious because they show the community's relations with the Persian power not through decrees but through a gesture.
A student of Amemar. Through him the sayings and rulings of others reached Rav Ashi—among them the homiletic exposition of Gebiha of Argiza (Gittin 7a). By Rav Sherira's letter he was exilarch in Rav Ashi's lifetime; the reference book gives this as a reading and not as a firm fact, and we follow it.
On the timeline
Places
Related
Sources
Chazal: Mishnah, Talmud, midrash, Zohar
- Zevachim 19a, Gittin 7a — the king and the belt; the transmission of an exposition to Rav Ashi
Scholarship
- The Jewish Encyclopedia (1906) — the standing beside Rav Ashi and the reading of Rav Sherira's letter on the exilarchate
Basis: Talmud and midrash.