The Great Hajj of Mansa Musa: A Journey That Changed the World
In 1324, the emperor of Mali made the pilgrimage to Mecca with a retinue of sixty thousand and so much gold that he caused inflation across the Mediterranean.
Mansa Musa, the fourteenth-century ruler of the Mali Empire, is remembered chiefly for one thing: his pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324, which was conducted with a lavishness so extreme that it distorted the economy of every city he passed through. According to sources from Cairo, where he stopped on the way, the gold he distributed depressed the price of the metal for a generation. His arrival in Mecca was similarly sensational.
But the Hajj of Mansa Musa is more than an anecdote about medieval opulence. It is evidence of the depth and sophistication of West African Islamic civilisation at a time when European accounts of Africa were largely blank. The Mali Empire at its height controlled the most important gold and salt trade routes in the world; its scholars corresponded with counterparts in North Africa, Egypt and Andalusia; its capital, Niani, was one of the great cities of the medieval world.
