The Year of the Elephant — Birth of the Prophet ﷺ
The Prophet ﷺ is born into Banū Hāshim in the Year of the Elephant.
In the month of Rabīʿ al-Awwal, in the year an invading army with an elephant was destroyed near Makkah, the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ was born into the noble clan of Banū Hāshim of Quraysh.
His father ʿAbdullāh had passed away before his birth; he was nursed in the desert by Ḥalīmah al-Saʿdiyyah, and lost his mother Āminah at about the age of six, then his grandfather ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, after which his uncle Abū Ṭālib took him into his care.
Key figures
Reflections
- Allah prepared and protected him from the earliest age.
Source & authenticity · Compiled from standard Seerah works, principally Ar-Raheeq Al-Makhtum (The Sealed Nectar) by S. al-Mubarakpuri. Editorial summaries in our own words; dates per traditional sources. Long-form detail is expanded from vetted sources and under scholarly review.