There were active prophetesses in the Arabian Peninsula before and at the rise of Islam. The kāhina (diviner-prophetess) of pre-Islamic times functioned in ways similar to that of her male counterpart, the kāhin. She delivered the words of an oracle in a state of ecstasy, sometimes in bursts of rhymed prose, called sajʿ. She also practiced divination, including in matters important to the tribe as a whole such as war, and acted as a mediator. Kāhināt are sometimes said to consult with aṣḥāb (familiar spirits), and some may have belonged to priestly families (see, for example, Ibn Khaldūn, Tā…