The Ghana Empire
A West African state grows rich controlling the gold that crossed the Sahara.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 540 years
- Known to
- ± 50 years
- Era
- Post-Classical, Holocene
Ghana, in modern Mali and Mauritania, controls the southern end of the trans-Saharan routes from around the eighth century, taxing gold moving north and salt moving south. Arab geographers describe a wealthy court and a capital of two towns, one Muslim and one royal. It is the first of the great Sahelian empires, and gold from this region eventually supplied a large share of the coinage of the Mediterranean world.