59 Fun Facts About Mecca

Which archangel is said to have brought Muhammad the first verses of the Quran in a cave above Mecca?

Gabriel (Jibril) appeared to Muhammad in the cave about 610, tradition says, and commanded him to read; when he answered that he could not, the angel gripped him until the first verses came.

Which nearby city serves as Mecca's principal gateway and port on the Red Sea?

Jeddah, about 70 km west of Mecca on the Red Sea, became the gateway in the 7th century, when the caliph Uthman made it Mecca's official port; for centuries pilgrims coming by sea landed there.

What does the Arabic word 'Kaaba' literally mean?

Cube is the literal meaning of Kaaba, though the shrine is not quite one: it stands taller than it is wide, on a slightly oblong base. Muslims also call it Bayt Allah, the House of God.

In Islamic tradition, which prophet helped his father raise the foundations of the Kaaba?

Ishmael (Ismail) raised the Kaaba's foundations with his father, and Quran 2:127 has the pair praying as they work: 'Our Lord, accept this from us.'

The direction of prayer, towards the Kaaba, is called what?

Qibla is the direction of the Kaaba; after the move to Medina, Muslims briefly prayed towards Jerusalem until a Quranic revelation turned them towards Mecca. In a mosque a niche, the mihrab, marks it.

Which name does the Quran use for Mecca in the verse calling it the site of the first house of worship?

Bakkah is how Quran 3:96 names the site of the first house of worship for mankind; one traditional explanation ties the name to the crowds that press together around the House.

Ptolemy's 2nd-century list of Arabian cities includes which name long identified with Mecca?

Ptolemy's Geography lists Macoraba in Arabia Felix, which scholars long equated with Mecca; Patricia Crone challenged the identification in her 1987 book Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam.

Which tribe ruled Mecca and controlled the Kaaba's shrine at the time of Muhammad's birth?

The Quraysh took over the Kaaba from the Khuza'a under their leader Qusayy, generations before Muhammad was born into the tribe; guarding the shrine and its pilgrims made them masters of Mecca.

The 'Year of the Elephant', about 570, is named for the failed attack on Mecca by which ruler?

Abraha of Himyar, a Christian who ruled Yemen for the kings of Aksum, led elephants against Mecca in the year tradition gives for Muhammad's birth; the Quran's sura 'The Elephant' tells of birds pelting his army with stones.

The Cave of Hira, where the Quran was first revealed, is on which mountain outside Mecca?

Jabal al-Nour, the 'Mountain of Light', stands just outside Mecca; Muhammad used to retreat to the small cave near its top to pray alone, and tradition places the first revelation there about 610.

Muhammad's migration from Mecca to Yathrib in 622, the starting point of the Islamic calendar, is known as what?

The Hijrah became year one only later: the caliph Umar began counting from the first day of the lunar year in which it fell, 16 July 622 in the Julian calendar. Yathrib became Medina.

Which 628 treaty let Muhammad's followers make pilgrimage the next year and preceded the conquest of Mecca?

The Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, agreed in 628 just outside Mecca, set a ten-year truce and allowed the Muslims' pilgrimage of 629; its breach by Meccan allies led to the conquest of Mecca in 630.

Before Islam, roughly how many pagan idols is the Kaaba said to have housed?

Tradition counts 360 idols around the Kaaba, with Hubal chief among them; a hadith has Muhammad striking them with a stick as he entered Mecca in 630, declaring that truth had come and falsehood was finished.

Al-Azraqi reported that the pre-Islamic Kaaba held a painting of which two figures?

Jesus and Mary appeared in a painting inside the Kaaba, the 9th-century Meccan historian al-Azraqi wrote; one report in his chronicle says Muhammad spared it when the other images were erased in 630.

Tradition says Muhammad settled a clan quarrel over the Black Stone by having the rivals lift it together on what?

A cloak, or a sheet of cloth in some tellings, was spread out and the stone laid on it; the clan elders each took hold and lifted, and Muhammad set it in the Kaaba's wall with his own hands, so no clan lost face.

What is often claimed about the Black Stone's origin, though it has never been analysed?

That it is a meteorite is the popular claim, but no laboratory has ever tested the stone. It survives as fragments bound in silver and is said to have first broken apart in the siege of 683, when the Kaaba burned.

Which sect sacked Mecca in 930 and carried the Black Stone off to al-Ahsa?

The Qarmatians, a radical Ismaili sect from eastern Arabia, sacked Mecca during the Hajj of 930 and held the Black Stone for ransom for about twenty years before it came back to the Kaaba.

Pilgrims drink from, and carry home water from, which well inside Mecca's Grand Mosque?

Zamzam lies a few steps from the Kaaba; tradition says it burst from the sand for a mother and her thirsty infant, and that Muhammad's grandfather Abd al-Muttalib dug it out again after it had long been buried.

What is the name of the embroidered cloth that covers the Kaaba?

The kiswah, black silk embroidered in gold with verses from the Quran, is replaced every year; the old cloth is cut into pieces, which are kept, displayed or given away.

For centuries, into the 1900s, the Kaaba's covering was woven in and sent each year from which country?

Egypt clothed the Kaaba from early on: the caliph Umar is recorded draping it in linen woven by Coptic Christians, and Egyptian workshops later made the covering, carried to Mecca at the head of the pilgrim caravan.

In which month of the Islamic calendar does the Hajj take place?

Dhu al-Hijjah is the twelfth and last month of the Islamic year; because that lunar year runs about eleven days short of the solar one, the Hajj drifts through every season over the decades.

How many times do pilgrims walk counter-clockwise around the Kaaba in the tawaf?

Seven circuits make up the tawaf, walked counter-clockwise; pilgrims try to touch or kiss the Black Stone as they pass, though that is not required, and then go seven times between the hills of Safa and Marwa.

The walk between the hills of Safa and Marwa commemorates whose desperate search for water?

Hagar (Hajar), left in the barren valley with her infant son, ran back and forth between the two hills looking for water until a spring welled up; pilgrims retrace her steps in the rite called the sa'i.

The white seamless garments and ritual purity a pilgrim enters before the Hajj are called what?

Ihram is both the state of ritual purity and the dress: two seamless white cloths for men, plain enough that rich and poor look alike.

On which plain near Mecca do pilgrims stand in prayer on the 9th of the pilgrimage month, the Hajj's essential rite?

Arafat fills with pilgrims who stand in prayer from noon to sunset; anyone who misses this standing has not completed the Hajj, and tradition holds that Muhammad gave his Farewell Sermon here.

Jabal ar-Rahmah, a hill Hajj pilgrims visit near Mecca, means what?

Mountain of Mercy is what Jabal ar-Rahmah means; a tradition holds that Adam and Eve, cast out of paradise far apart, found each other again near this hill.

Mina, the valley near Mecca where pilgrims spend several nights of the Hajj, is nicknamed what?

City of Tents is Mina's nickname because the Hajj keeps pilgrims there for several nights, close to the pillars they stone; a tent city big enough for more than two million people now fills the valley.

The Stoning of the Devil at Mina re-enacts an episode from the life of which prophet?

Abraham (Ibrahim) is said to have thrown stones at Satan, who tempted him three times to disobey God's command to sacrifice his son; the three pillars at Mina mark the spots.

After a deadly 2004 crush, the pillars Hajj pilgrims stone at Mina were replaced with what?

Walls took the pillars' place: each is a far wider target, so many more pilgrims can throw at once instead of pressing toward a single post.

Which West African emperor's lavish 1324 pilgrimage to Mecca is said to have crashed the price of gold in Cairo?

Mansa Musa of Mali crossed the Sahara with a fortune in gold; chroniclers give him a caravan tens of thousands strong and say he gave away so much in Cairo that gold stayed cheap there for at least twelve years.

Which country lost the most pilgrims in the 2015 crowd crush at Mina, deepening its rift with Riyadh?

Iran counted 464 of its pilgrims among the dead, more than any other country reported; its leaders blamed Saudi mismanagement, talks on the next pilgrimage failed, and no Iranians made the Hajj in 2016.

Which festival begins on the 10th of the pilgrimage month, the day Hajj pilgrims sacrifice an animal at Mina?

Eid al-Adha, the Feast of the Sacrifice, is kept by Muslims everywhere, not only by pilgrims: families who can afford it slaughter an animal and share the meat with relatives, friends and the poor.

The 'lesser pilgrimage' to Mecca that can be made at any time of year is called what?

The Umrah, or lesser pilgrimage, can be made in any month and consists of circling the Kaaba and going between the hills of Safa and Marwa; it is no substitute for the once-in-a-lifetime duty of the Hajj.

Which celebrated Ottoman court architect remodelled Mecca's Great Mosque for Sultan Selim II in the 1570s?

Mimar Sinan, builder of Istanbul's Süleymaniye Mosque, replaced the Great Mosque's flat roof with small domes; his Ottoman additions are the oldest parts of the building still standing.

What title does the Saudi king hold in relation to Mecca and Medina?

Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques became the Saudi king's official style in 1986, when King Fahd took it in place of 'His Majesty'; Saladin and the Ottoman sultans had borne the title centuries before him.

Ibn Saud's capture of Mecca in 1924 ended which dynasty's rule over the city?

The Hashemites lost Mecca when Hussein, king of the Hejaz, abdicated in 1924 as Ibn Saud's fighters closed in; his sons Faisal and Abdullah already sat on thrones in Iraq and Transjordan, and Abdullah's heirs became kings of Jordan.

The militants who seized Mecca's Grand Mosque in 1979 proclaimed one of their number to be what?

The Mahdi, the redeemer expected before the end of time, was said to be Muhammad al-Qahtani, brother-in-law of the group's leader Juhayman al-Otaybi; he was killed in the two-week siege, and Juhayman was captured and executed.

Which country's special forces provided assistance and tear gas to end the 1979 Grand Mosque siege?

France quietly sent three GIGN advisers, who planned the assault and supplied the gas pumped into the mosque's cellars; false rumours of an American hand meanwhile led a mob to burn the US embassy in Islamabad.

Which English explorer made the Hajj in 1853 in disguise and later translated the Arabian Nights?

Richard Francis Burton reached Mecca in 1853 disguised as an Afghan Muslim and published a Personal Narrative of the journey; he was far from the first European inside, the Italian Ludovico di Varthema having got in as early as 1503.

Under Saudi law, who is prohibited from entering Mecca?

Non-Muslims are barred from Mecca by law, and papers are checked on the roads into the city. The ban has leaked all the same: over the centuries a number of Westerners slipped in disguised and wrote about it.

The central tower of the Clock Towers complex beside the Great Mosque stands how tall?

601 m makes the Makkah Royal Clock Tower the tallest clock tower in the world; the Saudi government built the seven-tower complex around it to lodge pilgrims in hotels a few steps from the Great Mosque.

Demolition of which Ottoman-era structure for the Clock Towers drew Turkish protest in 2002?

Ajyad Fortress, an Ottoman citadel of the 1780s on a hill overlooking the Grand Mosque, was razed in 2002 to make way for the Abraj Al-Bait towers; Turkey's culture minister called it a cultural massacre.

A Washington institute has estimated that what share of Mecca's thousand-year-old buildings were razed in two decades?

About 95% was the Gulf Institute's estimate; the losses came from hotel and mosque expansion and from a doctrine wary of shrines, which treats old houses and tombs of the Prophet's circle as invitations to idolatry.

The 300 km/h trains linking Mecca and Medina were built by Talgo, a train maker from which country?

Spain's Talgo supplied the trains as part of a Spanish-Saudi consortium; the 450 km line opened in 2018 and cut the trip between the two holy cities from as much as six hours by bus to a little over two.

Which disease, carried by pilgrims, struck the Hajj repeatedly in the 19th century and spread on to Europe?

Cholera travelled with pilgrims from India to Mecca, and those heading home carried it across the Middle East and beyond, so that Mecca came to be called a relay station for the disease on its way from East to West.

In Islamic tradition, what carried Muhammad from Mecca to Jerusalem and back in a single night?

A white steed called the Buraq, said to be bigger than a donkey but smaller than a mule, made the journey possible: a hadith has each of its strides reaching as far as the eye could see.

Which wealthy Meccan merchant hired the young Muhammad to run her caravans and later married him?

Khadijah ran her own trading business; she employed Muhammad in his early twenties to take a caravan to Syria, then proposed marriage herself, and she remained his only wife for some 25 years, until her death in 619.

The Quranic name for Mecca, Umm al-Qura, means what?

Mother of All Settlements, or Mother of Cities, is how Quran 6:92 speaks of Mecca; Saudi Arabia took the name Umm al-Qura for its official calendar, and a university in Mecca carries it too.

Which caliphate made Mecca its capital?

Abdullah ibn al-Zubayr ruled his rival Zubayrid Caliphate from Mecca between 683 and 692, until the Umayyads besieged and killed him; Ali had chosen Kufa, the Umayyads Damascus and the Abbasids Baghdad.

The Kaaba standing today was largely rebuilt under the Ottomans in the 17th century after what brought down its walls?

A flash flood did the damage: Mecca lies low in a valley where rare storms send torrents through the Great Mosque, and after the collapse Sultan Murad IV had the Kaaba rebuilt in granite quarried nearby.

Which company developed and built the Clock Towers hotel complex beside the Great Mosque?

The Saudi Binladin Group built the towers for the government; its founder, Mohammed bin Laden, made the firm the royal family's favoured builder, and Osama was one of his more than 50 children.

Who hid with Muhammad in a cave on Mount Thawr as the pair slipped away from Mecca to Medina?

Abu Bakr shared the cave for three days while his household slipped out from Mecca with food; Ali, meanwhile, had stayed behind as a decoy, asleep in Muhammad's bed.

Which Moroccan traveller set out for Mecca in 1325 and kept travelling for nearly thirty years?

Ibn Battuta left Tangier at 21 meaning only to make the Hajj and study along the way; he then wandered on for decades across Africa and Asia before dictating his travels back in Morocco.

What do pilgrims do to their hair to mark the end of the Hajj rites?

Shave or trim it: men usually shave their heads and women cut off a lock, which ends the consecrated state in which cutting hair or nails had been forbidden.

What is inside the Kaaba?

Roof pillars and hanging lamps are almost all there is: three columns hold up the ceiling, the lamps are of silver and gold, and the room is otherwise nearly bare. Muhammad's tomb lies in Medina.

Mecca's elevated Al Mashaaer Al Muqaddassah Metro, opened in 2010, runs only when?

During the Hajj season only: the line shuttles pilgrims between Mina, Muzdalifah and Arafat for a few days and then stands idle. It was built to take tens of thousands of buses off the roads between the holy sites.

According to a popular legend, what colour was the Kaaba's Black Stone when it first came down from paradise?

White was the stone's first colour, the legend says: it arrived pure white and turned black by absorbing the sins of the countless people who have touched and kissed it.

Which American activist made the Hajj in 1964 and said the mix of races he saw in Mecca changed his thinking?

Malcolm X described praying beside Muslims of all colours, 'from blue-eyed blonds to black-skinned Africans', treating one another as equals; he came home a Sunni Muslim, convinced Islam could overcome racial division.

When Mecca fell to the Muslims in 630, which former slave climbed onto the Kaaba to give the call to prayer?

Bilal ibn Rabah had been left in the burning sun and tormented for refusing to give up Islam, answering only 'One, One', until a fellow Muslim bought and freed him; years later his was the voice that rang out over Mecca.