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“We belong to a house which hands on the kingship by inheritance.”

As reported by al-Umari · Masalik al-absar (c. 1337), trans. Levtzion & Hopkins, Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History (1981), p. 268

Context Asked in Cairo by the emir Ibn Amir Hajib how he had become king, Musa began his answer with these words, as recorded by al-Umari.

Portrait of Mansa Musa
Mansa MusaMali · c. 1280–1337
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