There’s always talk about who the richest man is, with Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk constantly being at the front of the conversation, but did you know that the richest man in history was an African Emperor with a wealth that historians call indescribable? If you didn’t know this interesting piece of history, then let us school you…
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Mansa Musa was an African Emperor in the 14th century who ruled over the West African Empire, Mali. As an Emperor, Musa grew the Mali empire by expanding its territory all the way from the Atlantic Ocean to Niger, according to the BBC. With such a large empire, the Emperor was able to accumulate a wealth of natural resources, such as gold and salt, many of which he traded through Timbuktu, which enabled the Emperor to gain wealth and power, according to The British Museum.
In fact, during Musa’s reign, the Empire of Mali accounted for half of the world’s gold resources, which all belonged to the Emperor… Musa was super rich. However, not only was he rich, he was also generous. So generous that he actually crashed the Egyptian economy by spending so much of his gold, and this is how:
In 1324, Musa went on a pilgrimage to Mecca, a holy pilgrimage for Muslims. During this pilgrimage, the African Emperor traveled with a caravan of treasures and an extremely impressive entourage of over 60,000 people and herds of cattle, such as sheep, goats, and camels that carried hundreds of pounds of gold on their backs, according to All That’s Interesting, a history and science publication.
When Musa stopped in Egypt during his journey, he spent and donated so much of his riches that he caused the price of gold in Egypt to crash. It would take over 10 years for the Egyptian Economy to recover from the financial crisis that the emperor caused, according to All That’s Interesting.
Mansa Musa is also credited for making Timbuktu an Islamic University Center and for building mosques and public buildings for the cities he ruled over, according to The National Geographic. But after he died in 1337, the impressive empire that Mansa Musa had constructed slowly began to fall away when he was succeeded by his sons, who struggled to keep a tight grip on the legacy the Emperor had created.
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