Pre-Islamic Arabia · about 500-610

Mecca before Islam: caravans and the Kaaba

Around 600, Arabia lay between two exhausted empires. Students explore the oasis towns, caravan routes and the sanctuary of Mecca: the world into which the Prophet Muhammad was born.

Teach it live New Open on the map
Length
45 minutes
Ages
11–14
On the map
3 steps, AD 600
Live lesson
7 rounds, 3 on the map
Worksheet
Two A4 pages, with Classroom
You need
A projector; phones for live

Live lesson · new in Classroom

Teach it live. The class answers on their phones.

Put the board on the projector. Students join with a six-digit code, no account needed, and tap the map: where was the frontier, where did the grain come from. Their pins drop in together when you reveal, and the closest student takes the round.

€19 per month: every lesson live, every worksheet, cancel anytime. Rome at its height runs live for free.

A live lesson on the projector: the class's pins on the map around Alexandria, the closest students listed beside it A student's phone: the question and a map to tap
7 rounds
3 places to find on the map, quiz questions, a class vote and a one-line answer.
About 15 minutes
Run it as the map step, or to open the discussion. You move on with the space bar.
A report
Every answer, per student and per round, to read back or print after the lesson.
1

Introduction

5 min

Read aloud

Around 600, Arabia lay between two exhausted empires. Students explore the oasis towns, caravan routes and the sanctuary of Mecca: the world into which the Prophet Muhammad was born.

By the end of the lesson, students can

  • Locate Mecca, Yathrib (later Medina) and the two great empires around Arabia in 600 on the map.
  • Describe how people in Arabia lived: as nomads, as farmers in oases and as traders in towns.
  • Explain why Mecca mattered as a place of pilgrimage and trade before Islam.
2

Explore the map

12 min

Project the map, or let students follow on their own devices. Each step opens the map at the right year and place.

a

AD 600

Two giants around Arabia

Open the map in 600. Find the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire and the Sasanian Empire. Which one borders Arabia in the north-west, and which in the north-east? Who controls Yemen in the south?

Open this view on the map
b

AD 600

The Hejaz

Zoom in on the strip of land along the Red Sea marked Hejaz. Turn on the Cities layer and find Mecca. Why would a town grow in a dry valley here?

Open this view on the map
c

AD 600

Routes around Arabia

Turn on the Trade Routes layer. Follow the Maritime Spice Route and the Silk Road. Do they cross Arabia or go around it? What could Arabian caravans add to this trade?

Open this view on the map
3

Class discussion

14 min

Pick two or three. They run from what happened to why it mattered.

  1. Mecca had little water and no farmland. What made people come there anyway?
  2. Before Islam, fighting was forbidden in certain holy months. Why would that help traders and pilgrims?
  3. The Byzantine and Sasanian empires were at war from 602 to 628. How might that war affect the people of Arabia?
  4. Most Arabs belonged to a tribe. What could a tribe give a person that a state usually gives today?
  5. Historians disagree about how rich Mecca's trade really was. What kind of evidence would help settle the question?
4

Game round

9 min

No ruler in Rule History lived in Arabia around 600. Play one round as Justinian I, emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire a few decades earlier. Discuss: how did the wars of great empires like his shape life on the edges of Arabia?

Open Rule History
5

Worksheet

5 min

This worksheet comes with Classroom

€19 per month unlocks every worksheet, every live lesson and the class workspace. The free lesson prints without a subscription.