Muslim Gold

[Ken Koester]

On Wed, 17 Jun 1992 23:50:59 CST Lynn Nelson said:
>
>Both Ken and Christopher question why there was no economic
>discernible economic effect of the infusion of Muslim gold, and
>that is a difficult phenomenon to explain. Perhaps it would help
>if we remembered that silver, not gold, was the medium of
>exchange in the North. Gold was thus only a commodity, although
>an expensive one, and it did not really affect the Northern
>monetary economy.
>
>If it was a commodity, how was it "consumed" and why was it
>prized? Some, of course, went to the Byzantine empire in exchange
>for the various goods imported from the easterners, but gold was,
>in Germanic tradition, the preferred substance of gift (which is
>probably why our wedding rings, first-place medals, and
>retirement watches are gold). I would suspect that most of the
>Muslim gold was used by the Northerners to _give_ to each other
>in what were essentially non-economic transfers. There were also
>transfers that took gold out of even this form of circulation.
>
>For the Christians, gold was the appropriate gift to churches,
>and some objects that have survived from the ninth and tenth
>centuries suggest that ecclesiastical gold-work was highly
>advanced, while some saints' lives and other sources indicate
>that it was used lavishly. Christopher mentioned Viking hordes,
>and it is true that a great amount of gold was buried, and some
>of it is probably still unfound; but the Scandinavians also
>surrounded their leaders with rich "grave" goods, and the sort of
>ship that opens _Beowulf_ must have sent a large quantity to the
>bottom of the sea.
>
>Could we argue that the Caliphate of Cordoba invested a good
>portion of its wealth in eunuch slaves to serve as soldiers,
>servants, and bureaucrats -- non-renewable and non-productive
>investments -- and that the Northerners secured gold that they
>then employed in various non-economic transfer systems? White
>bracelets and red necklaces (or is it the reverse)?
>
>Lynn

Let's see how this works: northerners send slaves to Spain, sell them for
gold, use the gold for gifts and whatnot? But how did they recover the costs
of slave-raiding and transport? If they were paid only in gold, then some of
that gold had to have entered the economic mainstream. Even if a slaver
has his own ships, wagons, etc., and his men are to some extent his servants
or whatever, he still isn't self-contained; all that equipage has to be
maintained. Is the conclusion that not enough coin got back into circulation
even after all this to show much of an effect on prices or rough production?
(I suspect the conclusion is, we don't have enough data (and never will) to
know for sure.)

[Lynn Nelson]

Christopher makes a good point. If the ransom of Garcia Iniguez of 70,000 dinars paid to the Norse was derived entirely from customs on slaves passing through the Basque passes of the western Pyrenees, and if that duty was 1/30 of the value of the "merchandise", then it represented a total value passing through the mountains of 2,100,000 dinars -- very close to the average gold coinage of the Caliphate of Cordoba. I have reviewed this incident (the best analysis is that of Claudio Sanchez-Albornoz, "La autentica batalla de Clavijo" in Cuadernos de Historia de Espana 9 (1948) among other places), and it would appear that Garcia was captured in early 858 and that, by mid-860, he was at liberty and fighting against old allies an Muslim relatives of his family. Assuming that he had no other income, but had 10,000 dinars in his treasury that escaped seizure, he would have had two years to gain 60,000 dinars, or 30,000 annually. This would presume that a total value of goods of around 900,000 dinars had passed through his customs. This would have to be balanced against the fact that the Caliphate was also coining significant amounts of silver, so that the total coin production was have been considerably greater than 2,200,000 dinars annually. In addition, we cannot assume that slaves were the only commodity travelling through the passes. It would be adventurous to guess at the total value, but Toledo steel was already prized for both swords and breastplates and passed at the same rate as a slave, one _solidus_, the Muslims and Mozarabs were producing fine cloths, jewelry, carved ivory and ebony, and other luxury goods. This trade was probably not _too_ extensive, but it does suggest one answer to Christopher's question of what merchants may have done with their profits: bought luxuries to take back to the North. Nevertheless, Ken's point that there was no explosion of prices is quite true, not only of the North, but of the Caliphate of Cordoba also. Despite an annual coinage of the equivalent of 25 to 35 millions of _solidi_, prices did not soar in al-Andalus, so one must assume that there was a heavy and relatively steady drain of bouillon and plate. Norse raids in the mid to late ninth centuries, coupled with North African military adventures may have accounted for some of the drain, but the slave trade is the best candidate for the major cause. The Muslims of al-Andalus favored eunuchs, who by their nature cannot be replaced by natural increase. Both Ken and Christopher question why there was no economic discernible economic effect of the infusion of Muslim gold, and that is a difficult phenomenon to explain. Perhaps it would help if we remembered that silver, not gold, was the medium of exchange in the North. Gold was thus only a commodity, although an expensive one, and it did not really affect the Northern monetary economy. If it was a commodity, how was it "consumed" and why was it prized? Some, of course, went to the Byzantine empire in exchange for the various goods imported from the easterners, but gold was, in Germanic tradition, the preferred substance of gift (which is probably why our wedding rings, first-place medals, and retirement watches are gold). I would suspect that most of the Muslim gold was used by the Northerners to _give_ to each other in what were essentially non-economic transfers. There were also transfers that took gold out of even this form of circulation. For the Christians, gold was the appropriate gift to churches, and some objects that have survived from the ninth and tenth centuries suggest that ecclesiastical gold-work was highly advanced, while some saints' lives and other sources indicate that it was used lavishly. Christopher mentioned Viking hordes, and it is true that a great amount of gold was buried, and some of it is probably still unfound; but the Scandinavians also surrounded their leaders with rich "grave" goods, and the sort of ship that opens _Beowulf_ must have sent a large quantity to the bottom of the sea. Could we argue that the Caliphate of Cordoba invested a good portion of its wealth in eunuch slaves to serve as soldiers, servants, and bureaucrats -- non-renewable and non-productive investments -- and that the Northerners secured gold that they then employed in various non-economic transfer systems? White bracelets and red necklaces (or is it the reverse)? Lynn

[Tom]

Lynn- I like your argument and agree with the general points on the traffic in
gold. It may be important not to forget the saharan trade in gold and salt from
the Malian empire and the "bend" of the Niger. While Mansa Musa and the "glorio
us days" of Malian rule and gold trade come later, the increase in gold, salt a
nd a few slaves moving northward to the North African coastal ports in Morocco
and Algeria in exchange for leather goods, horses, and steel during the 9th to
11th centuries may not only account for the influx of gold via Al-Andalusia and
Southern France but also account for the increase in Northern European tradeab
le items including Slavic slaves into Spain and Al-Andalusia. You are right abo
ut the use of slaves including eunuchs in the "haram" or forbidden parts of the
household (domestics) and the use of slaves as house guards or militia. It wou
ld be important to know if the Andalusian slave (slavic or otherwise) was also
used in agricultural labor, in irrigation works, in construction, etc. Any idea
s? Tom Ricks

Dept. of History
Villanova University
Ri...@Villvm.Bitnet

[Christopher Currie]

Tom Ricks's reminder of the cross-saharan trade reminds me to raise another
question: is there any connexion between the fall-off of imports of European
slaves to al-Andalus and the Moroccan cross-saharan raids which led to the
destruction of one of the early sub-saharan African empires (?not Ghana,
I think) and the establishment of Muslim states there (sc. as a source
for slaves??) I forget the chronology.

By Mansa Musa's time, of course, Mali was a Muslim state.

Christopher

[Tom Powers]

I'm not certain of the chronology here -- this sort of thing is 'way
out of my field -- but I seem to remember that the great Moroccan trans-
Saharan expedition was in the 1590s. Its target was the last of the
great Central West African empires -- Songhai. Slavery could have had
little to do with that -- certainly not Andalusian slavery -- because
Andalusia didn't exist any more. All of Spain was by then Christian.
Further, by then the maritime slave trade had superseded the trans-
Saharan one, ships being far more efficient and economical means of
transport than caravans.
The collapse of the preceding great empire, Mali, came some 100
years earlier. I think it unlikely that it had much to do with the
European slave trade either, since the last Muslim state disappeared
from Spain in 1492. Besides, it's my impression that Mali's collapse
came mainly from the revolt of subordinate states, such as Songhai,
rather than from outside intervention. Again, Portuguese sea-borne
slave trading was already a factor then too.
I'm a lot foggier on Ghana's decline, but it seems to me that it
was related to Islamization. It resulted for a while in the dominance
of both West Africa and Muslim Spain (and the areas between) by a single
political entity (the Almoravids?) This would have been more like the
time under discussion. The Almoravids were Berbers and Islamic. But
Ghana was already Islamic (at least, it's ruling families and official
status were) by then. The Almoravid intervention in Ghana came in 1075
or so.
Mansa Musa, by the way, made his famous hajj in 1324.

[RA...@brandeis.bitnet]

>..................portions of original message....................<
...deleted................................. While Mansa Musa and the "glorio

us days" of Malian rule and gold trade come later, the increase in gold, salt a
nd a few slaves moving northward to the North African coastal ports in Morocco
and Algeria in exchange for leather goods, horses, and steel during the 9th to

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^

11th centuries may not only account for the influx of gold via Al-Andalusia and
Southern France but also account for the increase in Northern European tradeab

le items including Slavic slaves into Spain and Al-Andalusia....deleted....

Dept. of History
Villanova University
Ri...@Villvm.Bitnet

>...................................<

A few points of contention with an unknown bearing on your hypothesis:
--First, "Moroccan" leather was named thusly by Europeans, who could only
obtain it there. The actual fine leather goods were raised, tanned and worked
into finished products in sub-Saharan Africa. A few North African traders
were able to navigate the Sahara at the turn of the millenium, and
Europeans only saw sub-Saharan goods through these traders, thus the finely
tooled leathers of West Africa became known in Europe as "Moroccan" leather
because that is where Europeans got it. After the navigation problems
were solved, the name still stuck.
--Secondly, horses had a bad habit of dying quickly in nearly all regions of
sub-Saharan Africa, effectively removing their value as a large-scale item of
trade.
--THird, West Africans were smelting steel (as opposed to iron), of a grade
superior to anything which could be produced in Europe, from before the
time of Christ. It was not until 1828 that the crucial technological
process was discovered and patented in Europe. The fact that colonial
European powers were able to flood West Africa with imported iron and steel of
an inferior grade was a marketing and institutional phenomenon rather than a
demonstration of technological skills. The Archaeologist Peter Schmidt has
done the breakthrough work in this area, several years ago. Others
who have written on the subject includ Phillip De Barros and Candace Goucher.

While the hypothesis which you present may still be valid, but not with this
particular bundle of goods, becasuse two of them were exported from,
rather than imported to, West Africa, and a third was of limited value.

Best,
Rich Rath
Dept of History
Brandeis University
ra...@binah.cc.brandeis.edu