In 1324, Musa embarked on his famous pilgrimage to Mecca, on which he was attended by thousands of advisors and servants dressed in splendid garments, riding animals adorned with gold ornaments. He stopped in Cairo, the leading city of Egypt, and spent so much gold that he caused an oversupply of the precious metal. As a result, the value of gold
Plummeted throughout much of the Middle East for several years; thus, as an unintended result of his generosity, Musa nearly caused the collapse of several nations' economies.
Musa died in 1337 (some sources say 1332), and none of his successors proved to be his equal. Later kings found the vast empire difficult to govern, and they were plagued by religious and political conflicts. By the mid-1400s the Songhai, who rejected Islam in favor of their tribal religions, broke away from Mali and established their own highly powerful state.
But even more powerful forces had been awakened far away—yet another unintended result of Musa's display of wealth. Europeans had some idea of the vast gold supplies in Mali, but when rumors from Egypt began spreading westward, this sealed the fate of the African kingdom. Previously, European mapmakers had filled their maps of West Africa with pictures of animals, largely creations of their own imaginations intended to conceal the fact that they really had no idea what was there. But beginning in 1375, maps of West Africa showed Musa seated on a throne of solid gold. Eager to help themselves to the wealth of the distant land, Portuguese sailors began making their way southward. It was the beginning of the end of West Africa's brief flowering.
World History
