to Zam'ah, a gruff old man, and greeted him and then said, "Muhammad son of Abdullah son of Abdul Muttalib, has sent me to ask for Sawdah in marriage." The old man shouted, "A noble match. What does she say?" Khawlah replied, "She would like that." He told her to call her. When she came, he said, "Sawdah, this woman claims that Muhammad son of Abdullah son of Abdul Muttalib has sent me to ask for you in marriage. It is a noble match. Do you want me to marry you to him?" She accepted, feeling it was a great honor. Muhammad married Sawdah in the month of Ramadan, in the tenth year of his prophethood (i.e., in April–May 620), a few months after the death of Khadijah. According to Ibn Sa’d, Sawdah died in the year 54 after Hijra, If she lived to become an octogenarian she must have married Muhammad at the age of 27. If she reached the age of 90 then she could not have been older than 37 when she married the prophet who was 50 years old at that time. However, there are sources that put her death in the year 644. Sawdah went to live in Muhammad's house and immediately took over the care of his daughters and household, while Aisha became betrothed to him and remained in her father's house. There was great surprise in Mecca that Muhammad would choose to marry a widow who wasn't beautiful according to society's standards. Muhammad, however, remembered the trials she had undergone when she had immigrated to Abyssinia, leaving her house and property, and crossed the desert and then the sea for an unknown land out of the desire to preserve her deen. It was after the Hijrah that the first community of Muslims rapidly grew and flowered and bore fruit. When Sawdah got older, and some time after Muhammad's marriage to Umm Salama, some sources claim that Muhammad wished to divorce her. According to Ibn Kathir Muhammad was worried that Sawda might be upset about having to compete with so many younger wives, and offered to divorce her. Sawdah offered to give her turn of Muhammad's conjugal visits at night to Aisha, of whom he was very fond of, stating that she "was old, and did not have needs for men; her only desire was to rise on the Day of Judgment as one