Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Caravans of Gold, Fragments in Time: Art, Culture, and Exchange Across Medieval Saharan Africa

Caravans of Gold, Fragments in Time: Art, Culture, and Exchange Across Medieval Saharan Africa

Berzock, Kathleen Bickford

Hardcover

Art HistoryArchaeologyAfrican Art

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 069118268X
ISBN13: 9780691182681
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: Feb 26 2019
Pages: 312
Weight: 4.25
Height: 1.20 Width: 10.10 Depth: 11.40
Language: English

How West African gold and trade across the Sahara were central to the medieval world

The Sahara Desert was a thriving crossroads of exchange for West Africa, North Africa, the Middle East, and Europe in the medieval period. Fueling this exchange was West African gold, prized for its purity and used for minting currencies and adorning luxury objects such as jewelry, textiles, and religious objects. Caravans made the arduous journey by camel southward across the Sahara carrying goods for trade--glass vessels and beads, glazed ceramics, copper, books, and foodstuffs, including salt, which was obtained in the middle of the desert. Northward, the journey brought not only gold but also ivory, animal hides and leatherwork, spices, and captives from West Africa forced into slavery.

Caravans of Gold, Fragments in Time draws on the latest archaeological discoveries and art historical research to construct a compelling look at medieval trans-Saharan exchange and its legacy. Contributors from diverse disciplines present case studies that form a rich portrayal of a distant time. Topics include descriptions of key medieval cities around the Sahara; networks of exchange that contributed to the circulation of gold, copper, and ivory and their associated art forms; and medieval glass bead production in West Africa's forest region. The volume also reflects on Morocco's Gnawa material culture, associated with descendants of West African slaves, and movements of people across the Sahara today.

Featuring a wealth of color images, this fascinating book demonstrates how the rootedness of place, culture, and tradition is closely tied to the circulation of people, objects, and ideas. These fragments in time offer irrefutable evidence of the key role that Africa played in medieval history and promote a new understanding of the past and the present.

Published in association with the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University

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