Born in 570 in the Arabian city of Mecca, he was orphaned at an early age and brought up under the care of his uncle Abu Talib. He later worked mostly as a merchant, as well as a shepherd, and was first married by age 25.
Discontented with life in Mecca, he retreated to a cave in the surrounding mountains for meditation and reflection. At age 40, in the month of Ramadan, where he received his first revelation from Allah. Three years after this event Muhammadصلى الله عليه وسلم started preaching these revelations publicly, proclaiming that "God is One", that complete "surrender" to Him is the only way acceptable to Allah, and that he himself was a prophet and messenger of Allah, in the same vein as other Islamic prophets.
Muhammadصلى الله عليه وسلم gained few followers early on, and was met with hostility from some Meccan tribes; he and his followers were treated harshly. To escape persecution, Muhammadصلى الله عليه وسلم sent some of his followers to Abyssinia before he and his remaining followers in Mecca migrated to Medina (then known as Yathrib) in the year 622. This event, the Hijra, marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar, which is also known as the Hijri Calendar.
In Medina, Muhammadصلى الله عليه وسلم united the conflicting tribes, and after eight years of fighting with the Meccan tribes, his followers, who by then had grown to 10,000, conquered Mecca. In 632, a few months after returning to Medina from his Farewell pilgrimage, Muhammadصلى الله عليه وسلم fell ill and died. By the time of his death, most of the Arabian Peninsula had converted to Islam, and he had united the tribes of Arabia into a single Muslim religious polity.
