Growing Inequalities in the Mali Empire
Another important feature of the Mali Empire that we learn from Ibn Battuta
is how much social inequality existed. One of the consequences of the
expansion of empire through trade and military means was the capture of
prisoners of war, who then became sources of male soldiers and female
slaves. The Sahelian and Saharan towns of the Mali Empire were organized as
both staging posts in the long-distance caravan trade and trading centers for
the various West African products. At Taghaza, for example, salt was
exchanged; at Takedda, copper. Ibn Battuta observed the employment of
slave labor in both towns. During most of his journey, Ibn Battuta traveled
with a retinue that included slaves, most of whom carried goods for trade but
would also be traded as slaves. On the return from Takedda to Morocco, his
caravan transported 600 female slaves, suggesting that slavery was a
substantial part of the commercial activity of the empire’s fringes.
Gender Divisions
There were many more female slaves than male slaves traded in the empire, a
fact that points out the inequality that existed between the genders. The
variation in women’s social positions increased with the growth of the
empire’s towns. Women, usually slaves, were valued porters in the trans-
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The Annenberg Foundation copyright © 2004
Saharan caravan trade. They sometimes served as concubines. Additionally,
female labor produced salt, cloth for export, and most of the local foodstuffs
essential to the provisions required by urban centers. Men were hunters,
farmers, merchants, and specialists, in addition to frequently being
conscripted as soldiers.
A general feature of empires is the increased exploitation of social inequality.
Imperial growth everywhere depended in part on women, the appropriation
of female labor as well as the mechanisms for the exclusion of women from
the sources of political and economic power. An empire’s expansion
ultimately relied on its increasing the supplies of food for its armies and other
sources of wealth for trade. In addition to their reproductive role, women
produced goods. Not surprisingly, women had not played a prominent role
in the preimperial male-dominated elite authority of West African society,
either. Women are rarely mentioned in the oral historical record, which was
controlled by male griots and their male descendants. In the epic of Sunjata
they do appear as potential power sources—mothers, sisters, and
sorceresses—despite their unequal access to true political power.
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