Atikah bint Abd al-Muttalib (may Allah be pleased with her), paternal aunt of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him)

Sayyidah Atikah bint Abd al-Muttalib (may Allah be pleased with her) said: I saw (in a dream) a rider who came and stood upon the mountain of Abu Qubays and called out: O family of the treacherous! O family of the wicked! March out within three days. Then he took a rock from Abu Qubays and hurled it at the basin, and the rock shattered into pieces, and there was not a single house among the houses of Quraysh but a fragment of it entered it, except the houses of Banu Zuhrah. Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "This is a dream; conceal it and do not mention it to anyone." Then Abbas went and met al-Walid bin Utbah bin Rabi'ah and told him the dream, and al-Walid told his father, and the matter spread. Abbas said: In the morning I went out to perform tawaf of the House of Allah, and Abu Jahl was with some people of Quraysh talking about Atikah's dream. When Abu Jahl saw me, he said: O Abu al-Fadl! When you have finished your tawaf, come over to us. When I had finished, I came to them and sat with them, and Abu Jahl said: O sons of Abd al-Muttalib! Were you not content that your men should claim prophethood, until now your women too have begun to claim prophethood? Atikah has claimed in this dream of hers that the one who came in the dream said: March out within three days. So we will wait out these three days; if what you say turns out true, well and good; otherwise, if the three days pass and nothing happens, we will write against you that you are the most lying household among the Arabs. Abbas said: "By Allah! I did nothing in reply to him except deny it, and I said that she had not seen anything." Abbas said: When evening came, a woman from among the daughters of Abd al-Muttalib came to me and said: Have you become content with this wicked man, that he should speak ill of your men and then speak ill of your women too, while you listen and raise no objection to it? By Allah! If Hamzah had been there, he would never have said what he said. So I said: "By Allah! He has indeed done so, and I raised no objection against him; but by Allah, I will surely confront him, and if he does it again, I will answer him on your behalf." Abbas said: Then on the third day after Atikah's dream I went out in a state of anger, because an opportunity I had wished to seize had slipped from me. He said: By Allah! I was walking towards him, and he was a nimble man, sharp of face, sharp of tongue and sharp of sight, when suddenly he came out running towards the door of the Masjid. I said to myself: What is the matter with him, may Allah curse him? Is all this out of fear that I will revile him? Then it turned out that he had heard a voice I had not heard: he had heard the voice of Damdam bin Zur'ah bin Amr al-Ghifari crying out in the middle of the valley. He had cut his camel's nose, turned his saddle around and torn his shirt, and he was saying: O people of Quraysh! Muhammad has set out with his companions; I do not think you will reach it. Help! Help! Abbas said: "Then the events that came about kept me occupied from him and him from me."

Urwah said: Atikah bint Abd al-Muttalib, the paternal aunt of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him), lived with her brother Abbas bin Abd al-Muttalib. Shortly before Badr she saw a dream and was alarmed, so on the very night she awoke from her sleep in alarm she sent a message to her brother Abbas and said: I have seen a dream, and because of it I fear destruction for your people. Abbas asked: What did you see? She said: I will not tell you until you promise me that you will not mention it to anyone, for if the people hear it, they will harm us and say things to us that we will not like. So Abbas gave her his promise, and she said: I saw a rider coming on his mount from the upper part of Makkah, calling out at the top of his voice: O you treacherous ones, O you people of wickedness! March out within two or three nights. Then he entered the Masjid on his mount and cried out three times in the Masjid, and men, women and children inclined towards him, and the people fell into the severest alarm. Then I saw him on the roof of the Ka'bah on his mount, and he called out three times: O you treacherous ones, O you people of wickedness! March out within two or three nights, until the people of Makkah living between the two mountains heard his voice. Then he went to a huge rock and uprooted it from its base, then hurled it upon the people of Makkah, and the rock came on with a roar, until, when it was at the foot of the mountain, it broke into pieces. To my knowledge there is no house in Makkah left that a piece of that rock did not enter. So I fear that some calamity is about to descend upon your people. Hearing this, Abbas became alarmed and left her, and in the last part of the night he met al-Walid bin Utbah bin Rabi'ah, who was a close friend of Abbas, and he told him Atikah's dream and told him not to mention it to anyone. But al-Walid told his father, and Utbah told his brother Shaybah, and the matter kept spreading until it reached Abu Jahl bin Hisham and became widely known. When morning came, Abbas went out to perform tawaf of the House of Allah, and he found Abu Jahl, Utbah bin Rabi'ah, Shaybah bin Rabi'ah, Umayyah bin Khalaf, Zam'ah bin al-Aswad and Abu al-Bakhtari sitting and talking with some people. When they saw Abbas performing tawaf of the House, Abu Jahl called out to him: O Abu al-Fadl! When you have completed your tawaf, come to us. When Abbas had completed his tawaf, he came and sat down. Abu Jahl said: O Abu al-Fadl! What dream is this that Atikah has seen? Abbas said: She has not seen anything. Abu Jahl said: Indeed she has! O Banu Hashim! Were you not content with the lies of your men, that now you have brought us the lies of your women as well? We and you have been like two racehorses competing for honour and glory for a long time, and when the mounts drew level, you said: There is a prophet among us. Now all that was left was for you to say: There is a prophetess among us too. I know of no man or woman in Quraysh more lying than you. That day they caused Abbas severe hurt. Abu Jahl said: Atikah claims that the rider said: March out within two or three nights. So if these three nights pass and nothing happens, your lie will become clear to Quraysh, and we will write a document and hang it on the Ka'bah stating that you are the most lying household among the Arabs, both men and women. O sons of Qusayy! Were you not content that you have obtained the offices of the Hijabah, the Nadwah, the Siqayah, the Riwa' and the Rifadah, that now you have come to us with this claim that there is a prophet among you? That day they caused Abbas severe hurt. Abbas said to him: Hold on, O you with the yellowed backside! Will you desist? The lying is in you and in your household. Those present said: O Abu al-Fadl! You are neither ignorant nor senile. Abbas also had to face severe displeasure from Atikah because he had spread her account. Then, when it was the evening of the third night after the night in which Atikah had seen the dream, the rider sent by Abu Sufyan, Damdam bin Amr al-Ghifari, came to them and said: O Banu Ghalib! March out, for Muhammad and his companions have set out to attack Abu Sufyan's caravan; save your caravan. So Quraysh fell into the severest alarm, and they became fearful because of Atikah's dream, and they set out on every mount, strong and docile alike.

It is narrated from Mus'ab bin Abdullah and other narrators of Quraysh that Atikah bint Abd al-Muttalib (may Allah be pleased with her), when the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) defeated Quraysh at Badr, composed these verses about the truth of her dream and Quraysh's denial of it: "Did that dream not prove true, and did not one fleeing from the people come to you with its interpretation?
He gave you a true account of what he saw with his own eyes: how the sharp-edged swords cut through bodies.
You said: You have lied, though I did not lie; rather, the truth is denied only by one who is himself a liar.
And Hakim among them fled only out of fear of death, when all the ways had become narrow for him.
The morning of the people laid bare the resolve of their hearts, so that resolve vanished into thin air and their wits deserted them.
With sharp swords, in face-to-face fighting, they made your blood flow as the southern winds draw rain from the clouds.
How did the cousins of Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) find him on the day of the encounter, when in war experience is everything?
Did not such blows come to their aid that both ends of the night were bewildered at their resounding, and the stars appeared in the daytime?
May my father be sacrificed for Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) on the day of the encounter, when the hardships of war grip the people.
Just as his swords cool the hardships of my people, gently, after they had been harsh.
I have sworn that if you return, they will cut you down, armies whose flanks are surrounded by horsemen.
As though the light of the sun and its brilliance were a gleaming, radiant light on both its sides."