Caravans of camel riding merchants from North Africa crossed the Sahara beginning in the seventh century of the Common Era. Traders exchanged gold for something the West Africans prized even more: salt. Salt was used as a flavoring, a food preservative, and as today, a means of retaining body moisture. Trading Salt for Gold: The Ancient Kingdom of Ghana A trade caravan traveling in Africa. Ghana played an important role in early trans-Sahara trade. Also in West Africa, gold mined south of the Sahel was traded, pound for pound, for salt mined in the desert. This sounds doubtful, given that salt was so plentiful in Taghaza that they used blocks of it to build houses, whereas the Wangarians had to work hard to obtain relatively small quantities of gold. Salt from the Sahara desert was one of the major trade goods of ancient West Africa where very little naturally occurring deposits of the mineral could be found. Transported via camel caravans and by boat along such rivers as the Niger and Senegal, salt found its way to trading centres like Koumbi Saleh, Niani, and Timbuktu, Trading salt for gold was a practice done by the Tuareg Nomads of Niger. Blue robes, red sand, tents of woven grass—this is the beauty of the Tuareg tribe. Trading Salt for Gold: The Ancient Kingdom of Ghana. A trade caravan traveling in Africa. Ghana played an important role in early trans-Sahara trade. Photo from Wikimedia. Between the 9th and 11th centuries A.D., the kingdom of Ghana was rich. So rich, in fact, that its dogs wore golden collars and its horses wore silken rope halters and slept Medieval Ghana sat on a gold mine. Recommended Annotation Visible only to you
Salt from the Sahara desert was one of the major trade goods of ancient West Africa where very little naturally occurring deposits of the mineral could be found. Transported via camel caravans and by boat along such rivers as the Niger and Senegal, salt found its way to trading centres like Koumbi Saleh, Niani, and Timbuktu, Trading salt for gold was a practice done by the Tuareg Nomads of Niger. Blue robes, red sand, tents of woven grass—this is the beauty of the Tuareg tribe. Trading Salt for Gold: The Ancient Kingdom of Ghana. A trade caravan traveling in Africa. Ghana played an important role in early trans-Sahara trade. Photo from Wikimedia. Between the 9th and 11th centuries A.D., the kingdom of Ghana was rich. So rich, in fact, that its dogs wore golden collars and its horses wore silken rope halters and slept
Students will experience how Ghana became rich through the salt and gold trade . The Berber's will demonstrate how salt comes from salt water. The Waganara The Kingdom of Ghana was a medieval African civilization located in what is now Mauritania and western Mali. The empire's access to gold allowed it to trade for 4 Camel caravans transport salt from the trade. Gold was especially plentiful in areas to the south of Ghana. As you will see, Ghana collected taxes on gold In west Africa, three empires- Ghana, Mali, and Songhai- controlled the gold and salt trade. Between 1000 and 1500, cities on Africa's east coast also gained 13 Nov 2012 trade constituted a triangular system with the export southward of rock salt or evaporitic salts produced in the Sahara, exchanged for gold, Their trade of gold for salt was very profitable for everyone involved. For that reason, Arab merchants in the Maghrib would not let any merchant (such as Genoese
The trade was primarily concentrated on gold and salt, however while physical products were being traded, ideas also were being traded. 2. A sample completed You hope to make the journey worthwhile by trading salt and manufactured goods for as much gold as possible. The gold traders will want to receive as much of
Trading salt for gold was a practice done by the Tuareg Nomads of Niger. Blue robes, red sand, tents of woven grass—this is the beauty of the Tuareg tribe.