Al-Wāqidī said: Saʿīd ibn al-Musayyib was among the most proficient of people in dream interpretation; he had learned it from Asmāʾ bint Abū Bakr, and she had learned it from her father.

Maʿn ibn ʿĪsā narrated to us, reporting from Shuʿayb ibn Ṭalḥah, from his father: Asmāʾ said to her son, “My dear son, live with dignity and die with dignity; do not allow yourself to be taken captive by the people.” (1)

Hishām ibn ʿUrwah said: When thieves became numerous in Medina, Asmāʾ—during the governorship of Saʿīd ibn al-ʿĀṣ—acquired a dagger, which she kept beneath her pillow. (2)

ʿUrwah said: My brother and I visited our mother ten nights before he was killed, and she was in pain.

ʿAbd Allāh asked, “How are you feeling?”
She replied, “In pain.”
He said, “There is relief in death.”
She answered, “Perhaps you are longing for my death; do not.”

Then she laughed and said, “By Allah, I do not wish to die until one of two outcomes befalls you: either you are killed, and I seek reward for you, or you prevail, and my eyes are comforted. Beware of being offered any proposal that you do not approve of yet accept merely out of fear of death.” (3)

He (ʿUrwah) added, “What my brother meant was that he would be killed, and that this would distress her.”

At the time, she was one hundred years old.