Maymuna bint al-Harith: The Last Wife of the Prophet

Maymuna bint al-Harith al-Hilaliyya (c. 594-681 CE) was the last woman whom Prophet Muhammad ﷺ married, their union taking place in 629 CE (7 AH) during the compensatory lesser pilgrimage (Umrah al-Qada) that the Muslims performed a year after the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah. She was the final addition to the Prophet's household — after Maymuna, he married no other wife — and she holds the distinction of having lived the longest of all the Mothers of the Believers, surviving until approximately 681 CE (61 AH) and thus witnessing more than half a century of Islamic history after the Prophet's death.

Her life, though less marked by dramatic events than those of some other Mothers of the Believers, was characterized by steady, quiet piety, generous giving, and a deep devotion to worship that the community honored. She was also connected to the Prophet's family through multiple bonds: her sister Umm al-Fadl (Lubaba al-Kubra) was the wife of al-Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, the Prophet's uncle, making Maymuna both a wife of the Prophet and a sister-in-law of his closest paternal relative. Through these connections, she occupied a position at the intersection of the Hashemite family and the broader network of alliances that bound the early Muslim community together.

Lineage and Family Connections

The Banu Hilal

Maymuna belonged to the Banu Hilal ibn Amir ibn Sa'sa'a, one of the significant tribal subdivisions of the great Amir confederation. The Banu Hilal were a Bedouin people of central Arabia who, while not part of the Quraysh establishment, held a respected position in the broader Arabian tribal system. Her father was al-Harith ibn Hazn ibn Bujayr, and her mother was Hind bint Awf ibn Zuhayr — the same Hind bint Awf who was the mother of Zaynab bint Khuzayma, the "Mother of the Poor," making Maymuna and Zaynab half-sisters (or full sisters, according to some accounts).

This maternal connection to Zaynab bint Khuzayma — who had been briefly married to the Prophet before her death — meant that Maymuna was related to a previous Mother of the Believers. The family of Hind bint Awf was remarkable for the number of distinguished marriages its daughters contracted: multiple sisters married into leading families of Mecca and Medina, creating a network of kinship that connected the Banu Hilal to the most powerful figures of the early Islamic era.

Connection to the Hashemites Through Abbas

The most significant of Maymuna's family connections was through her sister Umm al-Fadl (Lubaba bint al-Harith), who was the wife of al-Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib — the Prophet's paternal uncle and one of the most prominent members of the Hashemite clan. This connection made Maymuna the sister-in-law of the Prophet's uncle and the aunt of Abbas's children, including Abdullah ibn Abbas, who would become one of the greatest scholars of the Quran and hadith in the next generation.

The marriage between Maymuna and the Prophet thus strengthened an already existing family connection: it bound the Prophet more closely to his uncle's household and reinforced the network of kinship that supported the Muslim community. Al-Abbas, who had not publicly professed Islam until the conquest of Mecca but who had quietly assisted the Prophet from within Mecca for years, saw his family's connection to the Prophet deepened by this marriage.

Previous Marriages

Before her marriage to the Prophet, Maymuna had been married twice. Her first husband was Mas'ud ibn Amr al-Thaqafi, from whom she was divorced (or who died; the accounts vary). Her second husband was Abu Ruhm ibn Abd al-Uzza, who died, leaving her a widow. By the time of her marriage to the Prophet, Maymuna was a mature woman in her mid-thirties who had experienced both divorce and widowhood, and who was seeking a new beginning.

The Marriage During Umrah al-Qada

The Context of 629 CE

The marriage of the Prophet to Maymuna took place in 629 CE (7 AH) during the Umrah al-Qada — the compensatory pilgrimage that the Muslims performed a year after the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah had prevented them from entering Mecca. Under the terms of the treaty, the Muslims were permitted to return the following year and perform the lesser pilgrimage, staying in Mecca for three days. This was the first time the Prophet and many of the Muslims had returned to their native city since the Hijra seven years earlier.

It was in this charged atmosphere — the Muslim community returning to the sacred city from which they had been exiled — that the marriage to Maymuna was proposed and contracted. The proposal came through al-Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, who facilitated the match on behalf of both his sister-in-law and the Prophet. Some accounts indicate that Maymuna herself initiated the proposal, offering herself to the Prophet — an act of piety that the Quran acknowledged as permissible (33:50).

The Marriage Contract

The marriage was contracted while the Prophet was in the state of ihram (the sacred state for pilgrimage), according to some accounts, or after he had exited ihram, according to others. This discrepancy in the sources generated a legal discussion in the hadith literature about whether marriage is permissible during ihram — with the majority view, based on other evidence, holding that it is not. Maymuna herself is reported to have clarified that the marriage took place after the Prophet had exited ihram, resolving the apparent contradiction.

The dowry was set at four hundred dirhams, consistent with the Prophet's practice of moderate dowries. The marriage was thus a simple affair, contracted during the pilgrimage visit to Mecca and making Maymuna the last woman to enter the Prophet's household as a wife.

The Name Maymuna

Before her marriage, Maymuna was known as Barra (meaning "pious" or "righteous") — the same name that Juwayriyya bint al-Harith had borne before her own marriage to the Prophet. As with Juwayriyya, the Prophet changed her name, this time to Maymuna, meaning "blessed" or "fortunate" — a name that reflected the Prophet's sense of the auspiciousness of the marriage and of Maymuna's character. The Prophet disliked names that seemed to claim righteousness for their bearer, preferring names that expressed gratitude or blessing.

Life in the Prophet's Household

Joining an Established Family

When Maymuna entered the Prophet's household, she joined a family that was already well-established and that included several other wives with longer tenure and more defined roles. She was the newest and last addition to a household that had developed its own dynamics over many years. Her adjustment to this environment required the same qualities that had characterized the other wives who had entered later in the Prophet's life: acceptance, patience, and willingness to find her place within an existing structure.

The sources describe Maymuna as a quiet, devout woman who did not seek to dominate the household or to compete with her co-wives for attention. Her temperament was gentle and her disposition was oriented toward worship rather than toward the interpersonal dynamics that occasionally created friction in the household. She settled into a life of prayer, charity, and domestic service that continued without interruption until the Prophet's death and beyond.

Piety and Devotion

Maymuna was known in the Prophet's household and in the wider community for her deep piety and devotion to worship. The sources describe her as a woman who was regular in her prayers, generous in her charity, and sincere in her faith — qualities that the community recognized and honored. Her devotion was of the quiet, consistent kind: not marked by dramatic public gestures but by the steady, daily practice of a woman whose relationship with God was the center of her existence.

Aisha bint Abu Bakr, who knew all the Prophet's wives intimately, described Maymuna as one of the most pious and God-fearing among them, and said that she was one of the most devoted to maintaining family ties (silat al-rahim). This combination of personal piety and attention to family bonds made Maymuna a respected elder in the community, sought out for her example as much as for her knowledge.

Generosity

Like several of the other Mothers of the Believers, Maymuna was known for her generosity. She gave freely from what she had, supporting the poor and maintaining the tradition of charitable giving that characterized the Prophet's household. The sources record instances of her freeing slaves and distributing her wealth to those in need — acts of charity that she performed throughout her life, including her long widowhood after the Prophet's death.

Hadith Transmission

A Significant Narrator

Maymuna bint al-Harith was a significant transmitter of hadith, narrating a substantial number of traditions concerning the Prophet's worship, his personal habits, his domestic conduct, and matters of Islamic law. Her narrations are preserved in the authoritative hadith collections — Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawood, Tirmidhi, Nasa'i, and Ibn Majah — and they contribute important details to the understanding of the Prophet's private life and religious practice. The total number of hadith attributed to her varies in the scholarly counts, but she is among the more prolific narrators among the Mothers of the Believers, second only to Aisha and Umm Salama in the volume of her contributions.

Among the subjects of her narrations were the Prophet's manner of performing ablution (wudu) — she provided one of the most detailed accounts of how the Prophet washed for prayer, describing the sequence of washing, the amount of water used, and the thoroughness of the process. She narrated extensively about his bathing practices (ghusl), providing the community with authoritative guidance on ritual purification. She reported on his prayer at night, his conduct during his wives' menstrual periods (she narrated the well-known hadith that the Prophet would recline in her lap and recite the Quran while she was menstruating — a tradition that established important legal principles about the degree of interaction permitted during menstruation), and various matters of personal hygiene and domestic practice.

These narrations, concerning the intimate and private dimensions of the Prophet's life, could only have come from a wife, and they contributed valuable detail to the comprehensive picture of the Prophet's Sunnah. The subjects she covered — ablution, bathing, prayer postures, sleeping arrangements, and the conduct of intimate life — were precisely those that required the testimony of someone with access to the Prophet's most private moments. No companion outside the household could have provided this information, and Maymuna's willingness to narrate frankly on sensitive matters was a service to the community that later scholars recognized and honored.

Her Students and Transmitters

Maymuna's hadith were transmitted by a number of narrators in the next generation, including her nephew Abdullah ibn Abbas (who was one of the most prolific hadith scholars of his age), Yazid ibn al-Asamm (another nephew who was particularly close to her and who narrated many traditions from her), Kurayb the freed slave of Ibn Abbas, and other members of her extended family. Through these transmitters, her knowledge of the Prophet's practice was preserved and incorporated into the permanent body of Islamic law and guidance.

The connection to Abdullah ibn Abbas is particularly significant: as the son of al-Abbas, who was the husband of Maymuna's sister, Ibn Abbas was her nephew by marriage and had direct access to her testimony throughout her long life. He visited her regularly, asked her about the Prophet's practices, and incorporated her reports into his own massive corpus of hadith transmission. Many of his narrations concerning the Prophet's private life and worship came through this family channel, making Maymuna an important source for one of the most influential scholars of the first Islamic century.

Yazid ibn al-Asamm, another nephew, was also a significant link in the chain of Maymuna's testimony. He lived near her during her final years and was present at her death and burial, transmitting accounts of her last days alongside the traditions of prophetic practice she had preserved. Through Yazid and Ibn Abbas together, Maymuna's testimony entered the mainstream of Islamic hadith literature and became part of the permanent foundation of the Sunnah.

Key Legal Traditions

Several of Maymuna's narrations became foundational texts in Islamic jurisprudence. Her report on the Prophet's bathing procedure was incorporated into the legal discussions of all four Sunni madhahib as an authoritative description of the Sunnah of ghusl. Her narration concerning the Prophet's recitation of the Quran while she was menstruating became a key text in the debate over whether a menstruating woman may touch or recite the Quran — a question that the jurists answered differently, but for which Maymuna's hadith provided essential evidence.

She also narrated traditions concerning food law (what animals were permissible to eat), the conduct of prayer, and the etiquette of domestic life. These traditions, covering the breadth of daily practice, ensured that Maymuna's contribution to Islamic law was not confined to a single area but spanned the range of topics that a wife and close companion would have observed.

Life After the Prophet's Death

The Longest-Surviving Wife

Maymuna bint al-Harith lived longer than any other wife of the Prophet, surviving until approximately 681 CE (61 AH) — nearly half a century after the Prophet's death. This extraordinary longevity made her a living link to the Prophet for two full generations after him, a woman whom people could visit in Medina to learn about the Prophet's life from one who had shared his household.

During these decades she witnessed the entire arc of the early Islamic period: the caliphates of Abu Bakr, Umar ibn al-Khattab, Uthman ibn Affan, and Ali ibn Abi Talib; the civil wars and the establishment of the Umayyad dynasty under her nephew-by-marriage Muawiyah; and the early decades of Umayyad rule. Throughout these turbulent times, she maintained her quiet life of worship and devotion in Medina, honored by the community as one of the last surviving connections to the Prophet himself.

Continuing Service

Throughout her long widowhood, Maymuna maintained her pattern of piety, charity, and service. She continued to transmit hadith to those who sought her out, providing testimony about the Prophet's practices that was invaluable for the scholars who were systematizing Islamic law and recording the Sunnah. Her house in Medina was a destination for knowledge-seekers, and her memory — sharpened by decades of reflection on what she had witnessed — preserved details that might otherwise have been lost.

Death and Burial at Sarif

The Return to Where It Began

Maymuna bint al-Harith died around 681 CE (61 AH) at Sarif — a place between Mecca and Medina that held special significance for her, for it was the location where her marriage to the Prophet had been consummated decades earlier. The sources differ on whether she was traveling when death overtook her or whether she deliberately went to Sarif knowing her end was near, wishing to die in the place where her life with the Prophet had truly begun.

Her nephew Abdullah ibn Abbas led her funeral prayer and oversaw her burial at Sarif, fulfilling his family duty to the aunt who had been his source for so many traditions of the Prophet. She was buried where she died, and her grave at Sarif became a known site — a modest marker of the place where the last wife of the Prophet, the longest-surviving Mother of the Believers, was laid to rest.

The Significance of the Place

The fact that Maymuna died and was buried at Sarif — the same place where her marriage was consummated — gave her death a quality of completion, as though her life had come full circle. She began her life as the Prophet's wife at Sarif, and she ended her earthly existence there. This coincidence (or perhaps deliberate choice) was noted by the biographers and gave her burial place a particular resonance in the community's memory.

Legacy and Historical Significance

The Last Addition to the Prophet's Household

Maymuna's distinction as the last wife of the Prophet carries theological significance in Islamic thought. After her, the Prophet married no other woman — his household was complete. This finality gave Maymuna's marriage a quality of closure: she was the seal of the Prophet's marriages, just as he was the seal of the prophets. The number and identities of the Prophet's wives — beginning with Khadijah and ending with Maymuna — formed a definite and closed set, and Maymuna's place at the end of this sequence was itself a part of the prophetic biography.

A Model of Quiet Piety

Among the Mothers of the Believers, Maymuna stands as a model of quiet, unpretentious piety — a woman whose greatness lay not in dramatic events or public prominence but in the steady, faithful practice of her religion over a long lifetime. She did not produce the scholarly output of Aisha, or play the political role of Umm Salama, or suffer the dramatic trials of Umm Habiba. Her contribution was more modest but no less genuine: a lifetime of worship, charity, hadith transmission, and faithful maintenance of the Prophet's memory.

The Value of Her Narrations

Maymuna's narrations concerning the Prophet's private life and worship remain an important part of the Sunnah. Her reports on matters of ablution, bathing, prayer, and domestic conduct contribute details that are essential for the reconstruction of the Prophet's daily practice and that have been incorporated into Islamic legal rulings across all schools of jurisprudence. Through her nephew Abdullah ibn Abbas, her testimony reached one of the most influential scholars of the first Islamic century and became part of the permanent fabric of Islamic knowledge.

Connection Across Generations

Maymuna's extraordinary longevity made her a bridge across generations — a woman who had known the Prophet personally and who lived long enough to transmit her knowledge to people born decades after his death. This role as a living link between the founding generation and those who came after gave her a significance that extended beyond the content of her narrations to her very existence as a witness. She was, for the community of the late first Islamic century, a living testimony that the Prophet had been real, that his household had functioned, and that the faith they practiced was grounded in historical reality.

The Umrah al-Qada and Its Historical Context

The Return to Mecca

The Umrah al-Qada (the Compensatory Pilgrimage) of 629 CE (7 AH) was one of the most emotionally charged events of the Medinan period. Under the terms of the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, signed the previous year when the Quraysh had barred the Muslims from entering Mecca, the Muslims were granted the right to return the following year and perform the lesser pilgrimage, staying for three days. For the Prophet and the Muhajirun, this was the first time they had entered their native city since the Hijra seven years earlier — a deeply emotional homecoming, even if temporary and circumscribed.

The Quraysh withdrew from the city during the Muslims' three-day stay, watching from the surrounding hills as the believers performed their rites. The atmosphere was one of restrained triumph: the Muslims were back in Mecca, circling the Kaaba and demonstrating their devotion, while their former persecutors looked on from a distance. It was in this charged context that the Prophet's marriage to Maymuna was arranged — an event that added a personal dimension to the political and spiritual significance of the visit.

The Arrangement of the Marriage

The marriage to Maymuna was proposed by al-Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, the Prophet's uncle and the husband of Maymuna's sister. Al-Abbas, who had remained in Mecca throughout the years of conflict (providing the Prophet with intelligence while maintaining his position among the Quraysh), now facilitated a family connection that would bind Maymuna to the Prophet's household. The proposal reflected the networks of kinship and alliance that characterized Arabian society: al-Abbas sought to strengthen the bonds within his extended family by bringing his sister-in-law into the Prophet's home.

Maymuna accepted the proposal — in some accounts, she offered herself in marriage to the Prophet, an act that the Quran specifically permits: "and a believing woman if she gives herself to the Prophet" (33:50). Whether she proposed or was proposed to, the marriage was contracted during the stay in Mecca, with a dowry of four hundred dirhams. The contract was straightforward and the wedding feast simple, consistent with the Prophet's practice throughout his life.

The Departure from Mecca

An interesting historical detail concerns the timing of the marriage's consummation. The Prophet wished to consummate the marriage in Mecca, but the Quraysh, strict about the three-day limit of the Muslims' stay, sent word that the period had expired and the Muslims must leave. The Prophet proposed holding the wedding feast in Mecca so the Quraysh could attend, but they refused — a refusal that the tradition notes as a lost opportunity for fellowship and reconciliation.

The Prophet and his party departed Mecca, and the marriage was consummated at Sarif — a place on the road between Mecca and Medina where the party halted. This location would become permanently associated with Maymuna: it was where her married life with the Prophet began, and it was where, decades later, she would die and be buried. The circle of beginning and ending at the same place gave her story a quality of narrative completeness that the biographers noted.

Maymuna's Sisters and Their Distinguished Marriages

The Remarkable Family of Hind bint Awf

Maymuna's mother, Hind bint Awf ibn Zuhayr, produced a family of daughters whose marriages connected them to the most powerful and distinguished figures of early Islamic society. The sisters of Maymuna married into leading households across Arabia, creating a network of kinship that gave the family exceptional influence and reach. This feature of Maymuna's background is noted by the biographers as evidence of the family's standing and of the esteem in which its women were held.

Among her sisters, the most significant for Islamic history was Umm al-Fadl (Lubaba al-Kubra bint al-Harith), who was the wife of al-Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib and the mother of Abdullah ibn Abbas, the great scholar and interpreter of the Quran. Through this connection, Maymuna was the maternal aunt of one of the most influential intellectual figures of the first Islamic century — a relationship that would prove significant for hadith transmission, as Abdullah ibn Abbas narrated numerous traditions from his aunt.

Another sister, Zaynab bint Khuzayma, had been briefly married to the Prophet before her death — making Maymuna both a successor and a relative of a previous Mother of the Believers. The family's connection to the Prophet through multiple channels — through Abbas's marriage to Umm al-Fadl, through Zaynab bint Khuzayma's brief marriage, and through Maymuna's own permanent union — created an exceptionally close bond between the Banu Hilal and the Prophet's household.

The Significance of Being the Last Wife

Theological Implications

The fact that Maymuna was the last wife the Prophet married carries a certain theological weight in Islamic thought. After her, the Prophet took no other wife — his household was complete, the community of the Mothers of the Believers was closed, and the number eleven (the total of his wives over his lifetime) was fixed. Just as the Prophet was described as the "seal of the prophets" (khatam al-nabiyyin) — the final prophet after whom no other would come — Maymuna was, in a sense, the seal of the Prophet's marriages: the final wife after whom no other would be taken.

This finality gives Maymuna's marriage a quality of closure and completion. The Prophet's marital life, which had begun with Khadijah twenty-eight years earlier, ended with Maymuna. The full arc — from the monogamous marriage of twenty-five years with Khadijah, through the period of multiple marriages in Medina that served various social, political, and compassionate purposes, to the final union with Maymuna — was now complete. Each marriage had served its purpose, and the household that the Prophet left at his death was the definitive community of the Mothers of the Believers.

The Number and Purpose of the Prophet's Marriages

The completeness of the Prophet's marriages with Maymuna invites reflection on the pattern and purpose of his marital life as a whole. After the death of Khadijah, the Prophet's marriages served various functions: providing companionship (Sawda), strengthening key alliances (Aisha as the daughter of Abu Bakr; Hafsa as the daughter of Umar), demonstrating new legal principles (Zaynab bint Jahsh), honoring war widows (Zaynab bint Khuzayma), liberating captive peoples (Juwayriyya), rewarding steadfastness (Umm Habiba), sealing tribal alliances (Maymuna through Abbas), and caring for women in need (Safiyya bint Huyayy).

Maymuna's position at the end of this sequence meant that with her marriage, the full range of purposes had been served and the household was complete. The tradition's treatment of her as "the last" carries this sense of finality and fulfillment.

Maymuna and Abdullah ibn Abbas

The Scholar-Nephew

Among the most significant relationships in Maymuna's later life was her connection to her nephew Abdullah ibn Abbas (d. 687 CE), the son of her sister Umm al-Fadl and the Prophet's uncle al-Abbas. Ibn Abbas grew up to become one of the greatest scholars of the first Islamic century — a man renowned for his Quranic interpretation, his encyclopedic knowledge of hadith, and his role as a source for an entire school of Islamic learning. His connection to Maymuna gave him direct access to a Mother of the Believers — a wife who could testify to the Prophet's private life, worship, and domestic practices from personal experience.

Many of the hadith that Ibn Abbas transmitted concerning the Prophet's domestic conduct came through his aunt Maymuna. He would visit her, ask her about the Prophet's practices, and transmit what she told him through the chains of narration that the hadith scholars would later authenticate. This relationship made Maymuna one of the most important sources for the Sunnah as transmitted through the Medinan and Meccan scholarly tradition, for whatever she narrated to Ibn Abbas entered one of the most respected and widely-transmitted lines of hadith transmission in Islamic history.

Specific Narrations

Among the traditions Maymuna narrated through Ibn Abbas and others are reports on the Prophet's bathing (ghusl), his ablution (wudu), his manner of sleeping, his night prayer, and his conduct during his wives' menstrual periods. The hadith in which the Prophet reclined in her lap and recited the Quran while she was menstruating became an important legal text, establishing that menstruation did not create the degree of impurity that would prevent physical contact between spouses or prevent the recitation of the Quran. This narration, transmitted through Maymuna, shaped juristic discussions across all the Sunni legal schools and remains cited in works of fiqh to the present day.

References and Further Reading

Primary Islamic Sources

Quran, Surah al-Ahzab (33:50) — concerning women who offered themselves to the Prophet in marriage
Quran, Surah al-Ahzab (33:6) — concerning the Prophet's wives as mothers of the believers
Sahih al-Bukhari, Book of Ablution (Wudu) — narrations from Maymuna on the Prophet's manner of ablution
Sahih al-Bukhari, Book of Bathing (Ghusl) — Maymuna's narrations on the Prophet's bathing practices
Sahih Muslim, Book of Menstruation — the hadith narrated by Maymuna concerning the Prophet's recitation during her menstrual period
Sahih Muslim, Book of Marriage — concerning the marriage during the Umrah al-Qada
Sunan Abu Dawood, Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Sunan al-Nasa'i — various narrations from Maymuna

Classical Islamic Sources

Ibn Sa'd, Muhammad. Al-Tabaqat al-Kubra. Edited by Eduard Sachau. Leiden: Brill, 1904–1940. [Compiled c. 845 CE] — biography of Maymuna bint al-Harith
Ibn Hisham. Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah. Edited by Mustafa al-Saqqa et al. Cairo: 1936. [Based on Ibn Ishaq, 8th century CE]
Al-Tabari, Muhammad ibn Jarir. Tarikh al-Rusul wa al-Muluk. Edited by M.J. de Goeje. Leiden: Brill, 1879–1901. [Completed c. 915 CE]
Al-Dhahabi, Shams al-Din. Siyar A'lam al-Nubala'. Beirut: Mu'assasat al-Risalah, 1981–1988. [Compiled c. 1348 CE]
Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani. Al-Isabah fi Tamyiz al-Sahabah. Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-Ilmiyyah, 1995. [Compiled c. 1449 CE]
Ibn Abd al-Barr, Yusuf. Al-Isti'ab fi Ma'rifat al-Ashab. Cairo: Nahdat Misr, 1960. [Compiled c. 1070 CE]

Academic and Scholarly Sources

Stowasser, Barbara Freyer. Women in the Qur'an, Traditions, and Interpretation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Ahmed, Leila. Women and Gender in Islam. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992.
Lings, Martin. Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources. Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1983.
Watt, W. Montgomery. Muhammad at Medina. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956.
Haykal, Muhammad Husayn. The Life of Muhammad. Translated by Isma'il Razi al-Faruqi. Indianapolis: North American Trust Publications, 1976.
Nadwi, Mohammad Akram. Al-Muhaddithat: The Women Scholars in Islam. Oxford: Interface Publications, 2007.