Timbuktu and Trans-Saharan Trade Cities

Timbuktu was founded around 1100 CE, according to tradition by Tuareg nomads, near a bend where the Niger River curves closest to the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, a position that made it a natural transshipment point between camel caravans crossing the desert from the north and river craft moving along the Niger to the south and west. The city rose to prominence under the Mali Empire, reaching the height of its fame under Mansa Musa (r. c. 1312-1337), whose pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324-1325 took him through Cairo with a retinue said to have distributed so much gold along the way that it measurably depressed the metal's value in Egyptian markets for years afterward, an episode recorded by contemporary Cairene chroniclers such as al-Umari, who interviewed Cairo officials shortly after Mansa Musa's visit.