Indian Ocean Trade Summary

Basil Davidson explains how gold contributed to Western, Northern, and Sub-Saharan African economy during the Trans-Saharan trade and Indian Ocean Trade. It all starts in Mali, a place that once had vast wealth represented by the amount of gold that was used as raw material as well as symbol of wealth among different classes based on the size of gold they possessed. The Mali kingdom grew to have this economic power by having main proprietorship of the routes along the Trans-Saharan trade road which were accessed primarily on camels. Mali was located in the heart of gold sites in West Africa. Behind this great expansion of Mali was Emperor Kunkun Musa who ruled from 1312-1337 CE. Musa doubled Mali’s land area by setting up trade routes along

Djenne, which is in the southern part of Mali, was a trade port with significant architecture and mosque that were important to the Muslim population that participated in the trade. Timbuktu, another trade port, was made into a vital city for literacy among those in the trade. Many scholars say that Timbuktu was proof of African people’s ability to thrive on their own without European intervention. Under the rule of Emperor Musa, Timbuktu was transformed into a cultural and educational site after Islamic libraries and universities were constructed. Connecting all of these sites was the Niger River which was not only a place of water for the agricultural industry in Western Africa but also where a lot of the gold was found that helped the Mali and Asante empires to thrive. The Asante empire grew out of a much more tumultuous causation through wars and dislocation caused by Europeans looking for gold on the ‘Gold Coast’ of

The city of Cairo in Egypt was a linkage between Western and Northeastern Africa. After gold was transported by a caravan of camels to the southern terminals of the Sahara, the caravan would make its way north to Cairo. Cairo was the end of the Trans-Sahara trade and the beginning of the trade with China, Middle East, and Australia. The Swahili civilization of Kenya took part in the trade with China and other countries, which helped it expand alongside with the construction and architectural masterpieces that were being built in Kilwa, Tanzania. The Swahili were one of the first to man ships against great storms and were doing it long before the Europeans learned the skill to do so. This was vital in the trade that took part in the distant countries. The city of Lamu was an important coastal city where boats from the Red Sea and distant countries would land. This city on the northern coast of Kenya provide a way for Africa to have connections to the outside world. Similarly, the Zimbabwe Kingdom thrived from its proximity to the coast where the trades in the Indian Ocean Trade took place. Great Zimbabwe had links to the trading city, Kilwa where some of the main goods traded were ivory and gold. In addition to this gold trade, Zimbabwe was the center of an array of awe-inspiring architecture and agricultural based economy that