Mali's Mansa Musa gave away so much gold he wrecked Cairo's economy

When Mansa Musa, emperor of the Mali Empire and often called the wealthiest person in history, set out for Mecca in 1324, he travelled like a moving treasury. Accounts describe a caravan of around 60,000 people and dozens of camels, each carrying about 300 pounds (136 kg) of gold.

Passing through Cairo, he spent and gave away gold so freely that he flooded the market with it. The flood was big enough to push the metal’s value down across Egypt — by some accounts the market had still not fully recovered 12 years later.

Mali’s riches came from controlling West African gold and salt trade routes. Musa’s journey did more than dent Cairo’s economy: it put Mali on the map of the medieval world, drawing the city of Timbuktu into prominence as a centre of trade and Islamic scholarship.