The small protruding structure seen on the northern slope of the Green Dome of Masjid an-Nabawi is often misunderstood and surrounded by legend, yet in reality it is a functional architectural feature with roots going back to the earliest days of Islam. Its origin predates the dome itself and is connected directly to a well-known incident involving Aisha (ra), the wife of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. After the Prophet’s passing, he was buried in Aisha’s chamber, which at that time had a simple roof of palm branches and mud. During a severe drought in Madinah, the people turned to Aisha for guidance. She instructed them to open a part of the roof above the Prophet’s grave so that nothing would block the connection between the grave and the sky. According to early historical reports, when this was done, rain fell abundantly. From that moment onward, a vertical opening above the grave was preserved as a symbolic and physical link to the heavens.
As the mosque expanded over the centuries, the grave was enclosed within protective walls, most notably the pentagonal structure built under Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz during the Umayyad period. These walls had no doors or side openings, ensuring the grave could not be accessed horizontally, yet the tradition of maintaining an opening above it was never abandoned. When the first dome was finally constructed in 1279 under the Mamluk sultan Qalawun, the builders deliberately incorporated an aperture at the top of the dome aligned with the Prophet’s grave. After a devastating fire in 1481, Sultan Qaitbay rebuilt the structure using a double-dome system—an inner dome over the grave and a larger outer dome visible from outside. Both domes were aligned with corresponding openings, creating a continuous vertical shaft from the grave to the sky.
The distinctive protrusion visible today on the Green Dome is the external protective cover for this original opening. Because rainwater flows along the curved surface of a dome, a simple flat hole would have allowed water to pour directly inside and damage the structure below. The protruding form acts as a weather hood that diverts rain while historically allowing ventilation and access to the opening when required. When the Ottomans reconstructed the dome in the early nineteenth century under Sultan Mahmud II and later painted it green in 1837, they preserved this feature, covering it with the same green-painted lead as the rest of the dome so that it became visually integrated into the overall structure.
In the modern Saudi period, the dome itself was preserved, but the religious practice associated with opening the window for rain prayers was discontinued in line with contemporary Salafi theology, which regards such practices as unsanctioned innovations. The opening was therefore permanently sealed, and today it remains as a historical architectural element rather than a functional religious feature. Despite this, a widespread modern myth claims that the protrusion contains the body of a man who attempted to demolish the dome and was struck dead. This story has no basis in historical sources, contradicts Islamic legal principles regarding purity, and is easily disproven by the fact that the protrusion is documented in architectural records centuries before the Saudi era.
In truth, the so-called “window” of the Green Dome is neither a miracle story nor a mystery, but a rare surviving fragment of fourteen centuries of religious tradition and architectural continuity. It represents the earliest physical attempt by the Muslim community to maintain a symbolic openness between the Prophet ﷺ and the sky, first through a simple opening in a palm-branch roof and later through a carefully engineered double-dome system. Today, sealed and silent, it stands as a visible reminder of how theology, devotion, and architecture have shaped the sacred landscape of Madinah across the centuries.
