Trans-Saharan Trade

Many of us can remember the movie on Africa that we watched last week. Throughout the telling of how some cities were created and the involvment of the Europeans the narrator told us a lot about their form of trade. We were introduced to their innerworkings of trading cattle between the wealthy and the working, but we were also introduced to a cross-cultural trade of gold. With this post I decided to examine just how the African's were able to trade their gold and what they would recieve in return.

With this examination I quickly found out that the Trans-Saharan Trade would give me many answers to most of my questions.

It is said that the Trans-Saharan trade did not begin until the eighth century AD. This cultural and commerical exchange between Western Africa and the Mediterranean world occurred in many different parts of Africa. Here are two...

Libyan tribe of Garamantes

The people of this tribe would travel in horse-pulled chariots through the desert. Their tracks were leading to the Niger Bend and a theory was created that they carried West African gold and ivory to the markets of Carthage and Rome.

Umayyid caliphate

In this vast area Northern Africa became a part of the Islamic world. It was a solid market that used gold as the main monetary system. This means that gold was a precious metal to the people of the Islamic world.

http://www.smi.uib.no/paj/Masonen.html

After reading about some of the wonderful ways of the African people I hope you are intrigued to learn more. As always, it was a pleasure, but now I am off to pass out candy to the adorable tricker-treater's.

Happy Halloween!