The Seven Mosques

This guide to the Seven Mosques in Medina centers on the siege of the Trench, when a Persian former slave named Salman convinced the Prophet Muhammad to dig a defense no Arab army had ever used, and roughly ten thousand fighters from Quraysh and its allies found themselves unable to get in. It follows Muhammad to this rocky rise on Mount Sela, where he climbed for three days running to pray for a way out of the standoff. Six small mosques still mark where companions held their posts that week, though tradition says there were once seven.