A serpent had coiled itself around the House, its head lying against its tail, and they were seized with intense fear of it, dreading that what they had already done might bring them to ruin. The Kaʿbah was their sanctuary, their protection from other people, and the source of their honor. When confusion overtook them and they saw no clear way forward, al-Mughīra ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar (1) ibn Makhzūm rose among them and reminded them of the advice he had given: that they must neither quarrel nor envy one another over its reconstruction, that they should divide the work into four parts, and that no unlawful wealth should be used in building it.

He related that once they agreed to this, the serpent rose into the sky and disappeared from their sight, and they regarded that as a sign from Allah. He added, “Some people say a bird snatched it up and dropped it toward Ajyād (2).”

Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq ibn Yasar (3) reports: When the Messenger of Allah ﷺ was thirty-five years old, Quraysh assembled to rebuild the Kaʿbah. They wanted to roof it over but were afraid to demolish it, for it was nothing more than a rough wall of loose stones (4) slightly taller than a man. They resolved to raise it and place a roof upon it because a group of men had stolen the Kaʿbah’s treasure, which used to be kept (5) in a pit inside the building. The treasure was found with Duwaiyk, a client of Banū Mulayḥ ibn ʿAmr of Khuzaʿah, so Quraysh cut off his hand. Quraysh allege (6) that the thieves had placed the treasure in Duwaiyk’s keeping.

At that time the sea had cast a ship belonging to a Roman merchant ashore at Jeddah; it broke apart, and they took its timbers and prepared them to roof the Kaʿbah.

Al-Umawī adds: That ship belonged to Caesar, king of the Romans. It was carrying building materials—marble, wood, and iron—which Caesar had sent with Bāqūm the Roman to the church that the Persians had burned in Abyssinia. When the vessel reached its anchorage at Jeddah, Allah sent a wind against it and smashed it.

Ibn Isḥāq (7) continues: In Mecca there was a Coptic carpenter, and they enlisted him to fashion whatever would be needed to repair the structure. A serpent used to emerge from the well of the Kaʿbah into which offerings were placed each day. It would bask (8) upon the wall of the Kaʿbah, and the people were afraid of it—for no one approached without the snake’s recoiling, hissing (9), and opening its jaws—so they