Mansa Musa

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Mansa (Kankan) Musa was a 14th century king (or Mansa) who ruled the Mali Empire from about 1312 to 1332. He is remembered for his hajj (pilgrimage) and as a benefactor of Islamic scholarship.

Hajj

In the 14th year of his reign (1324), he set out on his famous pilgrimage to Mecca. It was this pilgrimage that awakened the world to the stupendous wealth of Mali. Traveling from his capital of Niani on the Upper Niger River to Walata (Oualâta, Mauritania) and on to Tuat (now in Algeria) before making his way to Cairo, Mansa Musa was accompanied by a caravan consisting of 60,000 men including a personal retinue of 12,000 slaves, all clad in brocade and Persian silk. He also brought with him 80 to 100 camels loaded with 300 pounds of gold each. The emperor himself rode on horseback and was directly preceded by 500 slaves, each carrying a 6 pound staff of solid gold.

Mansa Musa's prodigious generosity and piety, as well as the fine clothes and exemplary behaviour of his followers, did not fail to create a most favourable impression. The Cairo that Mansa Musa visited was ruled over by one of the greatest of the Mamluk sultans, Al-Malik an-Nasir. The emperor's great civility notwithstanding, the meeting between the two rulers might have ended in a serious diplomatic incident, for so absorbed was Mansa Musa in his religious observances that he was only with difficulty persuaded to pay a formal visit to the sultan. The historian al-'Umari, who visited Cairo 12 years after the emperor's visit, found the inhabitants of this city, with a population estimated at one million, still singing the praises of Mansa Musa. So lavish was the emperor in his spending that he flooded the Cairo market with gold, thereby causing such a decline in its value that, some 12 years later, the market had still not fully recovered.

Later Reign

During his long return journey from Mecca in 1325, Musa heard news that his army had re-captured Gao. Sagmandia, one of his generals, led the endeavor. The city of Gao had been within the empire since before Sakura's reign and was a very important, though often rebellious, trading center. Musa made a detour and visited the city where he received the two sons of the Gao king as hostages, Ali Kolon and Suleiman Nar. He returned to Niani with the two boys and later educated them at his court.

Construction in Mali

Musa embarked on a large building program, raising mosques and universities in Timbuktu and Gao. In Niani, he built the Hall of Audience, a building communicated by an interior door to the royal palace. It was "an admirable Monument" surmounted by a dome, adorned with arabesques of striking colours. The windows of an upper floor were plated with wood and framed in silver foil, those of a lower floor were plated with wood, framed in gold. Like the Great Mosque, a splendid monument of Timbuktu, the Hall was built of cut stone. During this period, there was an extraordinary level of urban living. Sergio Domian, an Italian art and architecture scholar, wrote the following about this period: "Thus was laid the foundation of an urban civilization. At the height of its power, Mali had at least 400 cities [sic], and the interior of the Niger Delta was very densely populated"

Death

Mansa Musa died in 1332 and was succeeded by his son, Maghan I. Mansa Maghan was the first in a long line of destructive emperors that would start the slow decline of the Mali Empire until its complete disintegration at the beginning of the 17th century.

References

External links

History Channel: Mansa Moussa: Pilgrimage of Gold
Al-Umari's description of Mansa Musa's 1324 visit to Cairo
Sondiata and Mansa Musa on the Web web directory
African Legends page
African Events Mansa Musa page
Mansa Musa, from Black History Pages