Elliott Reid's video: Mansa Musa The Richest Man Ever Black History Project Video 26

Mansa Musa, the richest man who has ever lived (img) Mansa Musa means “Leader Moses” or “King Moses”. Moses is a prophet in all three of the Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The Arabic pronunciation, Musa, is a popular Muslim name. Mansa Musa was the brother of Mansa Abukari and inherited the throne in 1324 in his brother's absence whilst he travelled westwardly towards America. African Historian, Robin Walker, describes Mansa Musa as one of the most colourful west african personalities in history. Mansa Musa completed Hajj, an Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca (img), with 60,000 men, caravans of gold and 12,000 slaves, 500 in front of each horse, each carrying a golden shaft which weighed 3kg. Observers described his entourage as a “city moving through the desert”. Mansa Musa’s net worth was equivalent to OVER $400 billion. To put this into perspective, founder of Amazon, Jeff Besoz’s net worth is less than half of that. Most of Mansa Musa’s wealth came from Gold and Salt. Musa was a devout Muslim, and his pilgrimage to Mecca made him well known across northern Africa and the Middle East. To Musa, Islam was "an entry into the cultured world of the Eastern Mediterranean".[20] He would spend much time fostering the growth of the religion within his empire. Whilst in Egypt, on his way to Mecca, Mansa Musa spent so much gold that he crashed their Gold economy. It would take years for their gold economy to recover, but the people of Cairo would speak his name for years after Because of his nature of giving, Musa's massive spending and generous donations created a massive ten year gold recession (img). In the cities of Cairo, Medina, and Mecca, the sudden influx of gold devalued the metal significantly. Prices of goods and wares became greatly inflated. This mistake became apparent to Musa and on his way back from Mecca, he borrowed all of the gold he could carry from money-lenders in Cairo at high interest. This is the only time recorded in history that one man directly controlled the price of gold in the Mediterranean.[20] Some historians[who?] believe the Hajj was less out of religious devotion than to garner international attention to the flourishing state of Mali. The creation of a recession of that magnitude could have been purposeful. After all, Cairo was the leading gold market at the time (where people went to purchase large amounts of gold). In order to relocate these markets to Timbuktu or Gao, Musa would have to first affect Cairo's gold economy. Musa made a major point of showing off his nation's wealth (img). His goal was to create a ripple and he succeeded greatly in this, so much so that he lands himself and Mali on the Catalan Atlas of 1375. "He gave out so much Malian gold along the way that jelis [griots] don't like to praise him in their songs because they think he wasted local resources outside the empire," she said. "Contemporary accounts of Musa's wealth are so breathless that it's almost impossible to get a sense of just how wealthy and powerful he truly was," Rudolph Butch Ware, associate professor of history at the University of California, told the BBC. (img) Mansa Musa returned from Mecca with several Islamic scholars, including direct descendants of the prophet Muhammad and an Andalusian poet and architect by the name of Abu Es Haq es Saheli, who is widely credited with designing the famous Djinguereber mosque. Task: why would spending more Gold, crash the value of Gold? Explore the concept of supply and demand, inflation etc Task: Mansa Musa and Jeff Besos had amounted more wealth than many countries. This lead to the development of a middle class (more poor people became wealthy) but this also means they’re hoarding more wealth which could help other people. Explore the pros and cons of allowing people to amount huge wealth vs forcing wealthy people to share their wealth more via taxation