5 Gold Rings

In honor of the holiday season, we are re-releasing our 12 Days of Christmas special! For the next 12 days, we will re-release one episode a day, each one with our own spin on the classic holiday theme, "The 12 Days of Christmas."

Katie tells the story of Mansa Musa.

Transcript

Richest Man in History

Speaker 1 0:12

all right , everyone say it with me now five golden rings , that's some bling , let me tell you . And with that , cindy , I have to ask who do you think is the wealthiest person in all of history ? Lil Wayne ? No , no , I'm just kidding . I was thinking didn't he actually come up with the term bling ? No , he's not the inventor of bling . Oh , okay , so the richest person Minus no , he's mythical . But good guess , I give up . Well , I wouldn't have been disappointed if you had said Bill Gates , jeff Bezos or even Elon Musk . As of May 2021 , jeff Bezos' value is about 18, . Excuse me , jeff Bezos' value is about $187 billion , with a B dollars US dollars . So I mean , that's no sum to really shake a stick at . However , that's less than half the amount of money that the richest person in all of history was worth estimated .

Speaker 1 1:37

Does the name Mansa Musa ring any bells ? Yes , it actually does ring a bell , but don't know why . I really have heard that's . Oh , I know why I've heard of it because it's in our podcast . I was okay , spoiler alert , I was going to cover him in another . We do have a running list of , like our podcast , topics that we'd like to cover and people in history we'd like to cover , and so when this opportunity presented itself , I said you know what ? Let me just jump on it and get it out of the way .

Speaker 1 2:14

So yeah , so Mansa Musa was the king of the Mali Empire during the 14th century CE . During the 14th century CE . So he began his reign in 1312 . Which , if you ask me , I think he has the most interesting ascension to power story that I have ever heard . So his family was no stranger to power . This isn't a rags to riches kind of story , by any stretch of the imagination . The emperor who preceded him was Abu Bakari II , and Musa was asked to become his like a vice president , almost in case something happened to him or something like that . And this was very , very common at this time period for leaders in Mali . You have , like your backup guy . So one day Abu Bakari II decides he wants to find out what's on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean . He wants to find out what's on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean . So he gets approximately 2,000 ships together and he sets sail . He gets about 2,000 ships together and sets sail west to see what is on the other side of the horizon , and he never returns . So Musa becomes king and Mansa is actually it's an honorary title just like Khan is or like Genghis Khan . So he becomes the leader of the Malian Empire , and at the height of his power . This includes the modern countries of Senegal , Gambia , guinea , niger , nigeria , chad , martorinia , mali , burkina Faso and Ivory Coast .

Speaker 1 4:05

So Musa had made quite a bit of money from the salt and gold trade , the area of the world in which Mali is located . To the north , you have have the Sahara Desert and you've got salt mines , and then to the south , you've got rich deposits of gold , and he was able to capitalize on taxing both of those items , as they were traded in opposite directions . And so he didn't just make his money by mining these items , but also taxing them as well . Very smart guy . Items , but also taxing them as well Very smart guy .

Speaker 1 4:42

But he wasn't really that well known until he went on a hajj , which is a journey to Mecca in 1324 . He traveled . So to get to Mecca from the Malian Empire he had to travel approximately 4,000 miles , and let me tell you , mansa Musa did it in style , and he didn't do it alone . He had about 60,000 people , so we're talking slaves , servants , soldiers , supporters , who journeyed along with him across the Sahara , the Sahara . They stopped in Cairo , they stopped in Mecca . And he was so wealthy and so just generous with his wealth and just gave it out so freely that he , single-handedly , was able to cripple the economy of Cairo for a decade because he gave out so much gold and devalued gold so much in that Egyptian city by his one visit . That's how wealthy he was . Oh my gosh , oh my gosh . One visit . Well , you figure , 60,000 people just come upon the city for one trip and they use all their gold and everybody's got some gold . You get gold . It's like the ultimate version of the Oprah holiday episode .

Speaker 1 6:12

And , by all accounts , he treated everyone who traveled with him very well . Even his slaves were said to be outfitted in the finest silks . They carried golden spears , they were literally dripping with wealth and extravagance . Because if you have $400 billion with a B in modern money , that's like your children's children's children never have to ever worry about money . You can just bandy about like it's nothing . I can't even conceptualize having that much wealth . It's insane .

Speaker 1 6:53

But he also used his money for a number of charitable purposes and furthering education within his own country , um , furthering the arts . He built they said that he built a mosque every single Friday during his reign , and one of the mosques that he was , that he built still stands today and you can go visit it in Timbuktu . Yes , really so he built them all at like a cross throughout his travels Throughout the empire . As far as I know , not during his travels , but more just like across the Malian empire , which spans hundreds and hundreds of miles . So just anywhere you can throw up a mosque . It sounds like he was putting them up . He also . He also founded a number of universities , some of which are still in existence today , and he did quite a bit to enrichen his country . And at that time period , timbuktu was considered the epicenter of culture of learning . A center of culture of learning . It attracted thousands of scholars from around Africa and parts of the Middle East to come and study and learn and enrich themselves . That's incredible , mm-hmm . And I'm not sure exactly when he died . I've seen conflicting dates . I've seen 1332 . I've seen 1332 . I've also seen 1337 .

Speaker 1 8:22

And because of his travels on the Hodge , his reputation eventually made its way to Europe . Have maps from like the 14th and 15th centuries that he literally put the Malian Empire on European maps , just based on this one enormous trip that he took and it's been viewed as like the Eldorado of Africa , that a lot of Europeans had this idea that it was literally a city , you know , covered in gold , based on how wealthy he was and how much he did to build up the city itself . And for a lot of Europeans it sounded it was a very attractive . Some people thought of it almost as a myth because at this time period , you know the 1300s Europeans are dealing with the bubonic plague , they're dealing with civil wars left and right , they're dealing with just like their economy is absolutely crippled . So it's no wonder that the idea of this golden city state on a hill would sound so attractive . He became almost like a mythological figure . So that begs the question what happened to all his money ? So that begs the question what happened to all his money ? I guess it just got spent .

The Search for Mansa Musa's Treasure

Speaker 1 9:43

No-transcript is generations , generations of children , and are there any like legends out there about where gold might be hidden ? No , it's like it's all gone . It's all gone . There's no fairy tale , it's all gone . No , no . But I have seen some um youtube videos that have gone into a number of the mosques in Timbuktu that were built by him . Texts from the date all the way back from . You know 1100 , um , just that have not been translated into any other languages besides arabic . So , if you ask me , the treasure is really there . We need I don't . I have to do more research . I don't know if any of these texts have been scanned . Scanned the treasure , the treasure five golden rings , not five books of information . The real treasure is friendship , cindy , you and I making this podcast together . This is Mansa Musa's legacy friendship . I want money . This podcast together . This is Mansa Musa's legacy Friendship . I want money . I want 400 billion dollars . That's what I want and that's the story of Mansa Musa Five Golden Rings , thank you .