After seeing all of the wondrous monuments of Timbuktu, I became inspired to learn more about how this empire began. I knew that Timbuktu was located right on the Niger river, but I wanted to learn more about its trade routes connected to the rest of Africa, Europe, and Asia. I spoke with merchants who told me the silk road comes close to the city, but since the silk road has no true end, merchants from Greece all the way to China, come to visit and trade goods with the city. Great Chinese inventions and weapons of war such as color printing, block printing, and exploding cannonballs traveled along the silk road all the way to Timbuktu. Not only ideas travel on the silk road though, in fact, one major exported idea from Timbuktu was Islam.
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