(^74) THE WEALTH AND POVERTY OF NATIONS
months in Egypt, and the visit was remembered for centuries
thereafter. He gave 50,000 dinars to the Sultan, who was not above
taking so princely a gift, and thousands of ingots to the shrines he
visited and the officials who entertained and ministered to him. By
the end of his stay, we are told, the value of gold in Egypt had fallen
by 10 to 25 percent.
Though the Mansa had come with a fortune in expense money—
eighty to one hundred camels bearing 300 pounds of gold each
(equals from 110 to 135 million of our dollars!)—he was penniless
by the end of his pilgrimage and had to borrow for his return. His
creditors were well reimbursed for their confidence, at 700 dinars for
every 300 he had borrowed.
The opulence impressed. Arab authors such as Ibn-amir Hajib and
Ibn Battuta have left us detailed accounts of the Mali king and
kingdom. The Mansa, they tell us, commanded more devotion from
his people than any ruler anywhere. He was the living embodiment
of majesty—from the way he held himself and walked to the way his
subjects showed their abject humiliation in his presence, prostrating
themselves, touching their heads to the ground, greeting his every
word with murmurs of wonder and approval. Let no man enter his
presence informally dressed; let no one even sneeze. Such signs of
impertinence brought death.
The legend of the Mansa's greatness reached Europe at second
hand. Maps, particularly the Catalan Atlas of 1375, showed the
ruler enthroned like a European monarch, crown on head, orb and
scepter in hand. "So abundant is the gold that is found in his
country," the Catalan Atlas noted, "that this lord is the richest and
noblest king in all the land." This admiration and esteem were not to
last. The gold trade diminished; Mali declined. In the later
fourteenth century, when the Portuguese got down to the African
"gold coast" and were able to penetrate Gambia, the successors of
Mansa Musa came to be seen as crude, pretentious stereotypes. Sic
transit.
The Importance of Being Covered
Nakedness was not a trivial consideration: it was construed in the
beginning as a sign of edenic innocence. Columbus, for example, was
nora
(Nora)
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