Skip to content

Companions

Asma bint Abi Bakr

أسماء

She of the two belts

  • c. 595 CE to 73 AH (692 CE)

At a glance

Companions
Dates
c. 595 CE to 73 AH (692 CE)
Who
Daughter of Abu Bakr and sister of Aishah, who helped the Prophet ﷺ and her father on the Hijrah
Stages
The Hijrah

ProfileAsma bint Abi Bakr

Asma (may Allah be pleased with her) was the daughter of Abu Bakr and the older half-sister of Aishah. She accepted Islam early, as a young woman. When the Prophet ﷺ and Abu Bakr prepared to leave Makkah in secret in 622 CE, she packed their food. She had nothing to tie the bag with, so she tore her waist belt in two and used one half for the bag and the other half for the water skin. This earned her the name Dhat an-Nitaqayn, she of the two belts.

While the two men hid in the Cave of Thawr, she brought them provisions at night, even though she was expecting a child. When Abu Jahl came to her door asking where her father was, she would not tell him, and he struck her.

She then migrated to Madinah and gave birth to Abdullah ibn az-Zubayr at Quba, the first Muslim child born there after the Hijrah.

She lived a long life of hard work and little comfort. She carried date stones on her head from her husband az-Zubayr's farm. She died in 73 AH, at about one hundred years of age.

Meet them inWhere they appear in the seerah

SourcesSources for this profile

Keep walking

One footstep at a time

Meet the rest of his family and Companions, or walk the whole road from Makkah to Madinah.