Mansa Musa - Lion King of Mali

From the fourth to the sixteenth century, three empires controlled much of West Africa and several key cities of the Saharan trade route. Between the empires of Ghana and Songhai, Mansa Musa reigned over the empire of Mali during its golden years. His control of gold mines and key cities in the Saharan trade route gave him the wealth he needed to attract the attention of the world.



This attention was directed towards Mali because of his devotion to Islam and his generous giving while on a hajj to Mecca. During his hajj, Mansa Musa came in contact with important architects that would establish a construction tradition that would last for centuries.

About seventy years before Mansa Musa took the throne, his grandfather, Sundiata, conquered the great Ghana empire in 1240 AD. In his childhood, Sundiata had been crippled and was forced into exile for fear of assassination by his brother who had become Mansa (king). Following Sundiata's magical healing and his brother's deaths by the foreign king of Soso, Sundiata returned to claim the throne. He conquered the king of Soso and the Ghana empire, and establish the empire of Mali. Following Sundiata's death, no less than six weak rulers claimed the throne of Mali. It was in this climate that Mansa Musa was born. It is unclear exactly when he was born or when he became king. Two spans of time have been suggested for his reign, 1307 to 1332 AD or 1312 to 1337, either way spanning a total of twenty-five years. Furthermore, very few facts have survived concerning his childhood, and the first important mention of his life was his famous hajj.

Mansa Musa's famous hajj (pilgrimage) placed him in history and in the attention of the entire European and Islamic world. About the time that the Aztecs began building Tenochtitlan, the and the Ottoman Turks began the creation of their empire, Mansa Musa began his obligatory hajj to Mecca in 1324 with an impressive company. In his caravan he brought sixty-thousand people dressed in fine silk and eighty camels carrying two tons of gold. Among this throng Mansa Musa had twelve-thousand servants, five hundred of which carried staffs of gold. If this entourage had not caught the attention of the countries he crossed through, his generous giving would.
Wherever he went he gave gold to the needy as given is required by a pillar of Islam. One writer even suggests that on every Friday during his travel he erected a mosque in the city that he found himself in. In Cairo he gave so much gold that in Egypt its value did not recover for twelve years. Before he returned to Mali, he had given away or spent so much that he was forced to borrow money from a merchant in Cairo for his return trip.

While most of the inhabitants of Mali were not Muslim, and although he allowed them to maintain their religious diversity, Mansa Musa remained distinctly Muslim. His pilgrimage to Mecca was a clear illustration of his devotion, but he showed his religious beliefs in several other ways. His grandfather before him had converted to Islam, and Mansa Musa established Islam as the national religion. He also built mosques and important Islamic centers of learning. Under his rule Timbuktu rose to become not only an important city in the trans-Saharan trade route but also the center of Islamic scholarship. Muslims came from distant countries to receive an education at the Sankore University that he built in Timbuktu. And it was because of his fulfillment of the hajj and his wealth of gold that these important sites were constructed.

Al-Omari, an ancient Muslim historian, described Mansa Musa as "the most powerful, the richest, the most fortunate, the most feared by his enemies and the most able to do good for those around him" in all of West Africa. Some of this wealth and power directly relates to the unique position of his empire along the Niger River basin and the crossroads of many major trans-Saharan trade routes. Two of these traded commodities were salt and gold; they were so important that in the fourteenth century they were used as currency. The salt trade originated from the North of Mali in the mines of Taghaza. The gold mines of Bambuk, on the other hand, laid within Mali territory. This gold was the source of half of the world's supply and greatly contributed to Mansa Musa's wealth. During his life, Mansa Musa also gained control of Timbuktu which stood at the crossroads of the Niger, an important means of transport, and the Saharan desert trade routes. This was the city where the Saharan salt merchants and the gold laden caravans converged. This provided Mansa Musa control of these two major commodities, and with this control his wealth increased. Interestingly, some of the construction of Timbuktu and other important cities can be directly linked to Mansa Musa's famous hajj.

While returning from Mecca, Mansa Musa brought back many Arab scholars and architects. Abu-Ishaq Ibrahim-es-Saheli, one of these architects, introduced new ideas into Mali architecture. With his help Mansa Musa constructed a royal palace, libraries, and mosques, and brought his trade city into international acclaim. This architect introduced to Mali a new mud construction technique that would establish a building tradition for centuries. With this technique he built the great Djingareyber Mosque at Timbuktu that stands to this day. He also built the great mosque at Jenne and a mosque in Gao that remained important for four centuries.

When Mansa Musa went on his hajj, he paraded his great wealth before the world. His generosity was quickly noted by European and Islamic nations alike. One contemporary, Spanish mapmaker depicted Mansa Musa seated on his thrown, gazing at a gold nugget in his right hand, holding a golden scepter in his left, and wearing a golden crown on his head. The Islamic world took notice because of his encouragement of Islam and his construction of Islamic centers of learning. These centers attracted Muslims from all over the world, including some of the greatest poets, scholars, and artists of Africa and the Middle east. This greatly increased the fame of Mali.

In the long run, partly due to Musa's conspicuous flaunting of wealth, when the ships of Portugal's Prince Henry captured Cuenta (in Morocco) in 1415, Moorish prisoners told more details of the gold trade. Henry set his explorers down the African coast to find a route across subSaharen Africa in order to contain Islam. Containment failed as Constantinople fell in 1453 and after the successful reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula to push out Islam, Europeans turned toward the Americas. However, it had been Mali gold that provided the initial material for exploration and conquest.

Mansa Musa died around 1337, leaving the throne to his son Maghan I. About this time the empire began to unravel. Songhai, a province in the east, left the empire. Mansa Maghan spent excessive amounts of Mali's wealth, leaving a weakened empire at his death around 1341 to his uncle Mansa Sulayman. While several of Mansa Musa's famous mosques remain to this day, the empire of Mali lasted no longer than two centuries following his death. By 1400 Timbuktu had been conquered by the Tuaregs, and war had broken out between the emerging Songhai empire and Mali. Following the reign of several weak kings and civil wars, the empire of Mali fell to the Songhai empire in 1546. By the 18th century Mali had completely disappeared.

SOURCE
This page has a good bibliography

More about Mansa Musa

Mansa Musa - King of Mali

Mansa Musa - An African Builder

Ibn Battuta

Setting out in 1352, lbn Battuta went by way of Fez and Sijilmasa

It is a lovely city. In it there a great deal of sweet dates. The town of Basra is like it for the abundance of its dates, but the dates of Sijilmasa are sweeter. …We arrived after 25 days at Taghaza. It is a village with no good in it. Amongst its curiosities is the fact that the construction of its houses and its mosques is of rock salt with camel skin roofing and there are no trees in it, the soil is just sand. In it is a salt mine. It is dug out of the ground and is found there in huge slabs, one on top of another as if it had been carved and put under the ground. …The blacks exchange the salt as money as one would exchange gold and silver. They cut it up and trade with it in pieces. …We stayed in it but ten days in miserable condition, because its water is bitter and it is of all places the most full of flies.

This desert is a travelling distance of ten days and there is no water in it except rarely. But we found much water in it in pools left by the rains. One day we found a pool of sweet water between two hillocks of rocks. We quenched our thirst from it and washed our clothes. In that desert truffles are abundant. There are also so many lice in it that people put strings around their necks in which there is mercury which kills the lice …They we arrived at Tásarahlá where water is exuded by the ground.

From there they travelled to Iwalatan (Walata or Oualata in Mauritania) and on to Malli a journey of twenty four days for a person who exerts himself.

That road has many trees which are tall and of great girth: a caravan can find shade in the shadow of one tree … Some of those trees have rotted inside and rainwater collects in them... Bees and honey are in some and people extract the honey from the trees. I have passed by one of these trees and found inside it a weaver with his loom set up in it - he was weaving. I was amazed by him.... There are trees whose fruits are like those of plums, apples, peaches and apricots, though they are not quite the same as these. There are trees that bear fruit like the cucumber, when it ripens it bursts uncovering something like flour, they cook it and eat it and it is sold in the markets. They dig out from the ground a crop like beans and they fry it and eat it. Its taste is like fried peas. Sometimes they grind it and make from it something like a sponge cake, frying with gharti; gharti is a fruit like a plum which is very sweet and harmful to white men when they eat it. The hard part inside is crushed and an oil is extracted from it. From this they derive a number of benefits. Amongst these are: they cook with it, fuel the lamps, fry that sponge I mentioned with it, they use it as an ointment, and they mix it with a kind of earth of theirs and plaster the houses with it in the way whitewash is used.

.... After a distance of ten days' travel from Iwalatan, we arrived at the village of Zaghari, which is a big place with black merchants living in it.

Then we went from Zaghari and arrived at the great river, the Nile. On it is the town of Karsakhu. The Nile (Niger) descends from it (Karsakhu) to Kabara, then to Zagha.

Then the Nile (Niger) comes down from Zagha to Tunbuktu (Timbuktu), then to Kawkaw (Gao), the two places we shall mention below. Then the river flows to Yufi, which is one of the biggest cities of the blacks. A white man cannot go there because they would kill him before he arrived there. Then the river comes down from there to the land of the Nubians who follow the Nasraniyya (Christian) faith, and on to Dunqula (Dongola), which is the biggest town in their land. …Then it descends to the cataracts. This is the last district of the blacks and the first of Uswan (Aswan) in Upper Egypt.

I saw a crocodile in this place on the Nile (Niger) near the shore like a small canoe.

Then we went from Karsakhu and reached a river called Sansara, which is about ten miles from Malli.

My entry into Malli was on the fourteenth of the first month of Jumada in the year '53 (i.e., 753 A.H., 28th June A.D. 1352), and my going out from there was on the twenty-second of Muharram in the year '54 (i.e. 754 AH., 27 February A.D. 1353). I was accompanied by a merchant known as Abu Bakr ibn Yacqub. We set out on the Mima road. I was riding a camel because horses were dear, costing about one hundred mithqals apiece. We reached a large arm of the river which comes out of the Nile (Niger) and which cannot be crossed except in boats. That place has many mosquitoes and nobody passes through except at night. We arrived at the arm of the river in the first third of the night and it was moonlight ... I saw on its bank sixteen beasts with enormous bodies. I was astonished by them. I thought they were elephants because there are plenty there. Then I saw them entering the river and said to Abu Bakr ibn Yacqub. 'What beasts are these?' He said 'These are horses of the river (hippopotami), they have come out to graze on the dry land.' They are more thickset than horses and they have manes and tails, their heads are like the heads of horses and their legs like the legs of elephants. I saw these horses another time when we were travelling on the Nile (Niger) from Tunbuktu to Kawkaw: they were swimming in the water and raising their heads and blowing. The boatmen feared them and came in close to the shore so as not to be drowned by them.

…Then we departed from this village which is by the branch of the river I mentioned, and we arrived at the town of Quri Mansa. There my camel which I was riding died. When I was told by its keeper I came out to look at it. I found the blacks had eaten it as their custom is in eating a dead animal. I sent the two boys I had hired to serve me to buy me a camel at Zaghari which was a distance of about two days journey. Some of the friends of Ibu Bakr son of Yacqub stayed with me while the latter went ahead to receive us at Mima. I stayed there for six days and was entertained by one of the pilgrims in this town until the two boys arrived with the camel.

…Then I departed for the town of Mima. In its neighbourhood we dismounted by some wells. We travelled then from there to the city of Tunbuktu, which is four miles from the Nile. Most of its inhabitants are Massufa, people of the veil. Its governor is called Farba Musa. I was present with him one day when he appointed one of the Massufa as amir over a company He placed on him a garment, a turban and trousers, all of them of dyed material. He then seated him on a shield and he was lifted up by the elders of his tribe on their heads.

…At Tunbuktu I embarked on the Nile (Niger) in a small vessel carved from one piece of wood. We used to come ashore every night in a village to buy what we needed of food and ghee in exchange for salt and perfumes and glass ornaments. Then I reached a town whose name I have been caused by Satan) to forget. This town had as its amir an excellent man, a pilgrim called Farba Sulaiman, well known for his bravery and tenacity, no one was able to bend his bow. I did not see among the blacks anyone taller than he nor more massive in body.

Then I travelled to the city of Kawkaw (Gao). It is a big city on the Nile, one of the best of the cities of the blacks. It is one of the biggest and most fertile of their places, with much rice. milk, chicken and fish. In it there are inani pumpkins which have no rivals. The transactions of its people in buying and selling are carried out by means of cowries—as is the case among the people of Malli. I staved there about a month and was the guest of Muhammad ibn cUmar of the people of Miknasa. He was a gentle person, fond of making jokes, a man of merit. He died there after I left.

…Then I travelled from there in the direction of Takadia (Takidda) in the hinterland with a large caravan of the men of Ghadamas (Ghadames in Libya), whose guide and leader was al-Hajj Wujjin.

I had a camel for riding and a she-camel for carrying provisions. When we set out on the first stage the she-camel broke down. AI-Hajj Wujjin took what was on her and divided it among his companions. They shared out the burden. There was in the caravan a Maghribin of the people of Tadala who refused to carry any of it in the way other people had done. My servant lad was thirsty one day. I asked the Maghribin for water; he did not give it.

Then we arrived at the land of the Bardama people, a tribe of the Berbers. The caravan cannot travel except under their protection; and amongst them the protection of a woman is more important than that of a man. They are nomads, they do not stay in one place. Their dwelling places are strange in form: they set up poles of wood and place mats around them, over that they put interwoven sticks and over them skins or cotton cloth. Their women are the most perfect of women in beauty and the most comely in figure, in addition to being pure white and fat. I did not see in the land anyone who attained to their standard of fatness. These women's food is cow's milk and pounded millet; they drink it mixed with water, uncooked, morning and evening. A man who wants to marry among them has to settle with them in the country near them, and not take his spouse farther than either Kawkaw or Iwalatan.

…We exerted ourselves in travelling till we reached the city of Takadda…The houses of Takadda are built of red stone. Its water supply flows over the copper mines and its colour and taste are changed by that fact. There is no cultivation there except a little wheat which is eaten by the merchants and visitors. It is sold at the rate of twenty of their mudds for a Mithqal of gold.

…The people of Takadda carry on no business but trading. Every year they travel to Egypt and bring from there everything there is in the country by way of fine cloths and other things. For its people ease of life and ample condition are supreme; they vie with one another in the number of slaves and servants they have—as likewise do the people of Malli and Iwalatan. They do not sell educated women-slaves, except very rarely and at a great price.

…There is a copper mine outside Takadda. The people dig for it in the earth, bring it to the town, and smelt it in their houses. This is done by their men, and the women-slaves. When they have smelted it into red copper, they make it into rods about the length of a span and a half: some are of fine gauge and some thick. The thick are sold at the rate of four hundred rods for a mithqal of gold, the fine for six or seven hundred to the mithqal it is their means of exchange. They buy meat and firewood with the fine rods: they buy male and female slaves, millet, ghee, and wheat with the thick. Copper is carried from there to the city of Kubar in the land of the unbelievers, to Zaghay and to the country of Barnu which is at a distance of forty days from Takadda. Its people are Muslim; they have a king whose name is Idris, who does not appear before the people nor speak to them except from behind a curtain. From this country are brought beautiful slave women and eunuchs and heavy fabrics. Copper is also taken from Takadda to Jujuwat and to the land of the Murtibin and to other places.

...I wanted to travel to Tuwat. I carried provisions for seventy nights since food is not to be found between Takadda and Tuwat, only meat and milk and ghee which are bought in exchange for cloth. I left Takadda on Thursday, the eleventh of Shacban in the year '54 (AH. 754, 11th September A.D. 1353) in a big caravan which included Jacfar al-Tuwati, who is an eminent person, and the faqih Muhammad ibn cAbd Allah, qadi of Takadda. In the caravan there were about six hundred slavewomen. We arrived at Kahir in the land of the sultan of Karkari. It is a land of plentiful grass. The people buy sheep therefrom the Berbers and cut the meat into strips. This is carried by the people of Tuwat to their country.

From that land we entered into a wilderness with no buildings in it and no water: it is three days journey. Then we travelled after that fifteen days through a wilderness which has no buildings but there is water. We reached the place from which the road to Ghat and the road to Tuwat. And there are there water-beds whose water flows over iron; when white cloths are washed in it, their colour becomes black. We travelled from there for ten days, and arrived at the country of the Hakkar who are a tribe of the Berbers and wear face-veils. There is no good in them… We journeyed a month in the land of Hakkar: it has a scarcity of plants and an abundance of stones, the road too is rough.

Then we reached Buda which is one of the biggest villages of Tuwat. Its soil consists of sand and saline swamp. Its dates are plentiful but not sweet; yet its people prefer them to the dates of Sijilmasa. There is no cultivation there, no ghee, no olive oil. These things are brought to it from the land of the Maghrib. The food of its people is dates and locusts which are plentiful in their area. They preserve them as they store dates and feed on them. They go out to hunt locusts before sunrise when they cannot fly because of the cold.

We stayed at Buda some days, then we travelled in a caravan and in the middle of Dhu al-Qada we arrived at the city of Sijilmasa. I went out from it on the second of Dhu ' al-Hijja (29 December A.D. 1353) during a period of fierce cold. A lot of snow came down on the road. I have seen many rough roads and much snow in Bukhara and Samarkand and in Khurasan (in Persia), and in the land of the Turks, but I have never seen anything more difficult than the road of Umm Janaiba.

Source

Other websites about Ibn Battuta

Ibn Battuta

Saudi Aramco World Magazine

Ibn Battuta

Catalan map of Mali

This is a 14th century Catalan map showing Mansa Musa holding a piece of gold as an Arab trader approaches on camelback. A patron of education, King Musa chose Timbuktu as the location for the 14th-century Sankore Mosque which housed the University of Timbuktu, one of the world's oldest universities.

Pinpointing Timbuktu

Sahara - the Movie (2005)

One of my favourite authors wrote one of my favourite books - about an adventure in the Sahara. Which got made into one of my favourite movies.

Now while there is no action specifically set in Timbuktu, the action does take place in Niger and Mali. One of my favourite scenes in the movie, is in a mosque filled with scrolls. That scene gives an idea of what I beleive the ancient libraries and universities in Timbuktu may have looked like.

The People of Timbuktu

The Tuareg, Fulani, Arabs and Songhai are the main groups that shaped the history of Timbuktu. These groups intermarried and worked together as one united Islamic family.

The Tuaregs
The Tuaregs are nomadic people and desert dwellers. The Tuareg are either Messufa, Lamtuna, or Judaala, who traced their ancestry back to the Sanhaja. The Sanhaja traced their lineage back to the Himyar who are people of Southern Arabia. They, however, lived among the Berbers before crossing the Sahara and settling in West Africa. They are the founders of the city of Timbuktu. They contributed scholarly and commercially to the legacy of Timbuktu. Today, the Tuareg live in Mali and Niger.

The Fulani
The Fulani are nomadic people and are well-known for their herds of cattle. They are astute merchants and excellent Islamic scholars. The Fulani, the Tuareg and Arabs have been instrumental in spreading Islam in West Africa. They are nation builders and ruled over the Futa Jallon and Futa Tora. Under the leadership of Shayk Ahmadu, they formed the caliphate of Massina. In the 18th century, the famous Fulani scholar and warrior Uthman Dan Fodio founded the Sokoto caliphate in northern Nigeria. The Fulani produced most of the eminent scholars of Jenne and Massina. According to the manuscript number 43 of Ahmed Baba Center in Timbuktu, the Fulani trace their lineage back to the Koraysh of Mecca through Oqba ibn Yasir who married a Fulani princess of Futa Toro by the name of Madeumaa. From this marriage she had four boys. They are the ancestors of the Fulani tribes: these are the Diallo, Dicko, Sangare, Balde' or Ba, Barry and Diakite. Today, the Fulani are mainly in West Africa.

The Songhai
The Songhai people are sedentary people unlike the Tuareg, Fulani and Arabs. Their original capitol was fixed at Kukya, on the border of Niger and Mali. Later on they intermarried with the Sonike people under the Sonis and Askias dynasties. They are farmers and fishermen. They are the founders of the Songhai Empire and have brought a lot of prosperity, prestige and reputation to the Black people. They are good Muslims and have spread Islam in West Africa. They are generous, noble, hardworking, excellent and courageous warriors in addition to excellent planners and organizers. The Songhai Empire was one of the most democratic social entities of its time. The Empire was well managed politically and economically.

Islam arrived in the African continent in the 5th year of Muhammad’s prophethood; this would be around the 7th century.(CE) with the migration of his followers from Mecca to Abyssinia (Ethiopia). These early Muslims carried the noble message of Islam to Africa even before its explosive spread throughout the Arabian Peninsula. Upon reaching Abyssinia, the Muslims met with the King Negus who, impressed with their gentle and noble mannerisms, embraced Islam and himself became a Muslim. From there, Islam spread quickly like wild-fire throughout Bilad-us-Sudan (Black Africa). Muslim traders from East Africa reached sub-Saharan Africa where the Emperor of Ghana was also introduced to Islam. Because of their impressive character, he hired these traders as administrators in his government. They were so adept at managing his affairs that he converted to the Islamic faith. From there the Muslims reached Timbuktu through the Trans-Saharan caravan trade. Once in Timbuktu, they settled in Sankore around the 13th and 14th centuries. They are excellent traders and Islamic scholars. Their presence in Timbuktu has added more flavor to the already flourishing intellectual life. Timbuktu was a veritable melting pot. The city welcomed everyone.

Today, the city of Timbuktu continues to attract visitors from far away lands. Timbuktu is the city of light, the city of knowledge...it is the city of trade and the city of hospitality. Indeed, travelers have said that Timbuktu is the Rome of the Sudan, the Athena of Africa and the Mecca of the Sahara.

Timbuktu People

Fascinated by Timbuktu

I have been fascinated by Timbuktu for many years - ever since I learned that it once used to be a great medieval city of education and scholarship. It had universities for goodness sakes. It must have been famous. These days barely anyone has heard of it. There were also rumours that there may be many many ancient manuscripts still in the city.

I have started this blog because those ancient manuscripts are now being brought out of hiding, in order for their writings to be preserved and transferred to digital media for the entire world to read and enjoy. Also to tell the history of Islamic education in that city.

Mali Feature - NY Times - 2007