Seerah · Year of the Elephant, about 570 CE · Makkah

The Birth of the Prophet

The Prophet was born in Makkah into the clan of Hashim, part of Quraysh. His father Abdullah died before his birth, so he was born into the care of his mother Aminah and the protection of his grandfather Abd al-Muttalib.

The sources date the birth to the Year of the Elephant, when an army from Yemen advanced on Makkah and failed. Following custom, he was given to a wet-nurse of the Banu Sad, Halimah, and spent his early years in the desert before returning to his mother.

Commentary

The date deserves care. The Year of the Elephant is the fixed point in the sources, and 570 CE is the conventional conversion, but it is a reconstruction rather than a recorded date. The month is generally given as Rabi al-Awwal and the day as the twelfth, though other days are reported and the matter was debated by classical scholars. Presenting any of this as precisely known would overstate the evidence.

On the sources: The year is anchored to the Year of the Elephant; the CE conversion and the exact day are reconstructions and were disputed among classical scholars.