al-Azhar

Perhaps the most famous university in the Middle East, al-Azhar was founded in the tenth century CE and continues to function as one of the oldest institutions of learning in the world. Nearby the university is the well-known al-Azhar mosque and the Mosque of Hussain, the son of Ali b. Abi Talib, the son-in-law of the prophet Muhammad. In the mosque is a tomb said to contain the head of Hussain, and a special room containing a number of relics of the prophet Muhammad and his earliest followers.