Taif remained hostile and idolatrous.  Ever since it had rejected his message with contumely, in the days when he was but a religious visionary inspired by a dream, it had refused negotiations and even recognition to the blasphemous Prophet.

Now Mahomet conceived that his day of vengeance had come.  He invested the city, bringing his army close up to its walls, and hoping to reduce it speedily.  But the walls of Taif were strong, its citadels like towers, its garrison well provisioned, its inmates determined to resist to the end.  A shower of arrows from the walls wrought such destruction among his Muslim force that Mahomet was forced to withdraw out of range where the camp was pitched, two tents of red leather being erected for his favourite wives, Omm Salma and Zeineb.  From the camp frequent assaults were made upon the town, which were carried out with the help of testudos, catapults, and the primitive besieging engines of the time.

But Taif remained inviolate, and each attack upon her walls made with massed troops in the hope of scaling her fortresses was received by heated balls flung from the battlements which set the scaling ladders on fire and brought destruction upon the helpless bodies of Mahomet’s soldiery.  But if he could not impress the city Mahomet wreaked his full vengeance upon its neighbourhood.  The vineyards were cut down pitilessly, and the whole land of Taif laid desolate.  Liberty was even offered to the slaves of the city who would desert to the invader.  Nothing ruthless or guileful was spared by the Prophet to gain his ends, but with no avail.  Taif held out until Mahomet grew weary, and finally raised the siege, which had considerably lessened in political importance, owing to the overtures of the Hawazin, who now wished to be reconciled with Mahomet, having perceived that their wisdom lay in peace with so powerful an adversary.  They promised alliance with him and their prisoners were restored, but the booty taken from them was retained, after the old imperious custom, which demanded wealth from the conquered.

Mahomet forthwith distributed largesse among the lesser Arabs of the neighbourhood, an act of policy which called down the resentment of his adherents and caused the details of the law of almsgiving to be promulgated in the Kuran.  The Muslim point of view was that having fought for the spoil they were entitled to receive a share of it, but their leader held that it must first be distributed in part to those needy Bedouin tribes who had flocked to his banner.  The bounty had its desired effect.  Malik, the Hawazin chieftain, moved either by his love of spoil or genuinely convinced of the truth of Islam, possibly by the influence of both these considerations, tendered his submission to Mahomet and became converted.  February and March, 630, were occupied in distributing equitably the wealth that had fallen into his hands.

It was now the time of the Lesser Pilgrimage, and Mahomet returned to Mecca to perform it.  Then, having fulfilled every ceremony and surrounded by his followers, he returned to Medina, still the capital of his formless principality and the keystone of his power.