Lady Aisha (may Allah be pleased with her) narrates: The Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) used to perform eleven rak‘ahs between the time after finishing the ‘Isha prayer until the break of true dawn. In these, he would say salam after every two rak‘ahs and make them odd with one rak‘ah. In this, he would make one prostration so long that a person could recite fifty verses during it. Then, when the muezzin would finish giving the call to Fajr and the true dawn had appeared, the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) would get up and perform two short rak‘ahs. Then he would lie down on his right side until the muezzin would come to call him for prayer, and he would go with him. Different narrators have transmitted this incident with slight variations in wording.

Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Umar (may Allah be pleased with them both) narrates this statement of the Noble Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): "The voluntary prayers of the night and day are to be performed two by two."