The Prophet`s Mosque was the first institution to be built following Prophet Muhammad`s migration in 622 AD from Mecca, where he was born, to the town of Yathrib, which became known as “Al-Madina an-Nabi”, or “City of the Prophet”, and is today simply Madina. Surrounded as it was by the shops and stalls of all kinds of merchants, the new mosque soon became the political and economic as well as the spiritual nucleus of the city, and played both a practical and a symbolic role in unifying the citizens, ultimately providing a solid foundation from which the Prophet and his companions could set forth and establish the Islamic state.