Meccan surah

A Meccan surah (Arabic: سورة مكية, romanized: Surah Makkiyah) is, according to the timing and contextual background of their revelation (asbāb al-nuzūl) within Islamic tradition, a chronologically earlier chapter (suwar, singular sūrah) of the Qur'an.Thus, the Koran places surahs from longest to shortest, not from earliest to latest. The traditional chronological order attributed to Ibn Abbas became widely accepted following its adoption by the 1924 . The Meccan chapters are believed to have been revealed anytime before the migration of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina (Hijra). The Medinan surahs are those revelations which occurred after the move. There are 86 Meccan surahs. The Meccan phase of surahs is thought to be around 13 years in length.

Meccan surahs are typically shorter than Medinan surahs, with relatively short verses (āyāt), and mostly come near the end of the Qur'an. (As a general rule, the chapters of the Qur'an are ordered from longest to shortest.) Most of the chapters containing Muqatta'at are Meccan, Except 2, 3 and 13.

The chapters are divided into "Meccan" and "Medinan" sections mostly due to stylistic and thematic factors. Classification of the chapters into these periods is based upon factors such as the length of the verse and the presence or absence of certain key concepts or words (e.g., al-Rahman as the name of God).