They advanced—and when the clash of arms erupted there was not a single craven or shirker among them, nor any mounts left standing idle.

Men of aquiline bearing, heroes whose battle-dress, in the furnace of war, is mail as though forged by David himself.

They move forward with the measured stride of noble camels, yet their surest protection is the very blow they strike when the sluggish black battalions waver.

They do not exult when their swords find their mark against a people, nor do they panic when the stroke is turned against them.

The thrust of lances reaches only their throats, and they never turn away from the very pools of death.

In the year 8 AH Zaynab, daughter of the Prophet ﷺ and the eldest of his children, passed away. Umm ʿAṭiyya al-Anṣāriyya washed her, and the Prophet gave her his waist-wrapper, saying, “Make it her inner garment.” It was therefore placed beneath her shroud. Zaynab had borne, to Abū al-ʿĀṣ b. al-Rabīʿ b. ʿAbd Shams, a daughter named Umāmah, whom the Prophet would carry during the prayer.

In the same year the Prophet’s pulpit was built; he delivered a sermon upon it, and the palm-trunk beside which he had formerly preached groaned with longing for him.

That year also witnessed the birth of Ibrāhīm, son of the Prophet.

During the same year Sawda, Mother of the Believers, ceded her allotted day to ʿĀʾisha—may Allah be pleased with them both.

In that year, too, Mughafal b. ʿAbd Nuhm b. ʿAfīf al-Muzanī, father of ʿAbd Allah and a Companion, died.

The same year saw the death in Syria of al-Ḥārith b. Abī Shamir al-Ghassānī, the Arab king who ruled that region.