Is Mansa Musa the richest person of all time?
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hello and welcome to More or Less here on the BBC World Service. Let's start with a big number. 400 billion US dollars. That's the estimated fortune of the richest man that ever lived. It's not Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos from the 21st century or a Rockefeller or a Rothschild from the 19th century but Manson Musa, the ruler of the West African Malian Empire in the 14th century.
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This king is the richest and most noble lord of all of this region due to the abundance of gold which is collected in his land. He left no court emir nor holder of a royal office without the gift of a load of gold. The people of Cairo made incalculable profits out of him and his men in buying and selling and giving and taking.
Yes, today we're going to tell the story of Mansa Musa, the man the BBC, the Independent, CNBC, the Smithsonian and the History Channel have all called the richest man who ever lived.
Who was Mansa Musa and why is he called the richest man ever?
For that, we'll have to travel back seven centuries, but we'll also tell the story of how he got to the top of the rich list. And for that, we'll only have to travel back seven years. Mansa Musa was born in the year 1280, or at least that's the best guess. We don't actually know when he was born or when he died. And that's the big problem we have with Mansa Musa. We don't know that much about him. We have a few mentions of him by Arab historians, but nothing written at the time of the events of his life or by anyone who actually met him. What we can be sure of is that he was born into the Malian royal family and he inherited the Malian Empire from his brother, Mansa Abu Bakr, who sailed off across the Atlantic, never to be seen again.
How large and wealthy was the Mali Empire under Mansa Musa?
Dr Afusu Mensa Ababayo, the head of the Department of History at the University of Ghana in Accra.
Mansa Musa was a king of Mali, who became a king in the year 1312. He embellished himself with gold ornaments, jewelry, even the servants also.
What happened on Mansa Musa’s 1324 pilgrimage that revealed his wealth?
His empire covered an area the size of Western Europe. The kingdom stretched for about 2,000 miles, from the Atlantic Ocean all the way to modern-day Niger, taking in parts of what are now Senegal, Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, the Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea and Ivory Coast. With this large landmass came resources like gold. The British Museum said that during Mansa Musa's rule, the Empire of Mali accounted for almost half of the old world's gold. Dr Ofusu Mensa Ababeo describes the land as impregnated.
You see, the old Ghana Empire was known as a gold-impregnated area.
How much gold did Mansa Musa reportedly travel with and how is it valued today?
Then apart from that, a place called Bambouk, which is Senegal, then Buri, that is a current Guinea, and Buna, all of them were under his kingdom. And these were Orpheus or gold impregnated areas. And the gold in the forest cannot be quantified.
Where did the $400 billion estimate for Mansa Musa originate?
So on the basis of this, it can be extrapolated that he was one of the wealthiest kings during his time.
Musa was a devout Muslim and it was his faith in some ways that built his reputation when he embarked on a pilgrimage to Mecca. It was on this journey that Marley's wealth was exposed to the outside world. As he travelled through Egypt, he gave away and spent so much of his gold that it created huge inflationary problems in Cairo and damaged the economy for 10 years. And this wasn't a small city. Cairo was one of the biggest cities in the world at that time, with a population of several hundred thousand. The accounts of the wealth taken on the trip were staggering.
Musa made his pilgrimage in 1324.
Why do modern rich lists exclude monarchs and how does Forbes measure wealth?
His procession reported to include 60,000 men, 12,000 slaves, heralds dressed in silks who bore gold staffs, organised horses and handled bags. Musa provided all necessities for the procession, feeding the entire company of men and animals. Also in the train were 80 camels, which varying reports claim carried between 50 and 300 pounds of gold dust each.
Assuming each carried 175 pounds of gold, that would total 14,000 pounds or about 6,350 kilograms. And if the gold price today is $42,000 per kilo, that would equal around $266 million.
Can we fairly compare a 14th-century emperor’s wealth to today’s billionaires like Jeff Bezos?
If your spending money for a trip is a quarter of a billion dollars, then it's probably fair to suggest you're a billionaire many times over.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–1:11
2
Who was Mansa Musa and why is he called the richest man ever?
1:11–2:00
3
How large and wealthy was the Mali Empire under Mansa Musa?
2:00–2:20
4
What happened on Mansa Musa’s 1324 pilgrimage that revealed his wealth?
2:20–3:05
5
How much gold did Mansa Musa reportedly travel with and how is it valued today?
3:05–3:25
6
Where did the $400 billion estimate for Mansa Musa originate?
3:25–4:16
7
Why do modern rich lists exclude monarchs and how does Forbes measure wealth?
4:16–5:02
8
Can we fairly compare a 14th-century emperor’s wealth to today’s billionaires like Jeff Bezos?
5:02–8:58