The Fleet That Sailed West from Mali
A king of Mali sent hundreds of ships west across the Atlantic to find its far side, then sailed after them himself. None came back.
What was reported
When Mansa Musa, the immensely rich ruler of the Mali Empire, passed through Cairo on pilgrimage in 1324, he told an official how he came to the throne. The king before him, he said, wanted to know whether the ocean had another side, and sent out hundreds of ships with gold, water and food. Only one returned, its captain saying the others had sailed into a great current in the open sea and vanished.
The king then prepared a far bigger fleet, put Musa in charge of the kingdom, and sailed west himself. He was never seen again.
Explanations offered
The account was written down by the Arab scholar al-Umari and is the only source. Some have argued that the fleet reached the Americas, but there's no archaeological evidence of it; others suggest the ships were lost in the Atlantic's currents. The voyage remains one of history's great open questions.
- When
- Early 1300s
- Where
- The Atlantic, off the coast of West Africa
- Witnesses
- Mansa Musa, as recorded by the scholar al-Umari
- Status
- Unexplained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.
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