Richest man to have ever lived was actually $160,000,000,000 better off than Elon Musk
Money makes the world go round, but it's something of a Monkey's Paw situation - the more you have, the more you want.
Still, when it comes to the bank balance of Elon Musk sitting at a pretty $240.2 billion, it's nothing to be sniffed at.
After slipping into second place at the start of 2024, Musk has once again regained his crown as the world's richest person thanks to a boost from his startup xAI raising $6 billion.
While it remains tight at the top between the world's richest person, what's a few billion between friends?
Advert
Still, while Musk is laughing (literally) all the way to the bank, his wealth is a mere pittance compared to the richest man who ever lived.
As Jacob Davidson wrote for Money.com in 2015, the richest man who ever lived was Malian ruler, Mansa Musa.
Musa's wealth was so vast, the site lists him as 'richer than anyone could describe,' although it then goes on to try and describe.
Known as the King of Timbuktu, Musa’s kingdom in West Africa was likely the largest producer of gold in the world at the time.
Gold was even more of a commodity back when Musa reigned between 1312 and 1337, so you can see why he'd be sitting on mountains of money.
It's hard to work out exactly what Mansa Musa was worth because records are hard to come by, however, Celebrity Net Worth suggests it was in the region of $400 billion.
The Bloomberg billionaire's list puts Musk's current worth at $240.2 billion while Forbes' own rankings of the world's billionaires for October 2024 listed him as having $270.5 billion before his controversial Tesla moves wiped a ton off his worth. It might not seem like a big difference on paper, but trust us, $30 billion is more than a few spare cents.
Either way, Mansa Musa was a LOT richer than Musk is.
There are tales of a pilgrimage to Mecca where Musa spent so much money, he caused a currency crisis in Egypt.
There's also a mention of dozens of camels carrying hundreds of pounds of gold, 200,000 men in his army, over 40,000 archers. Rudolph Ware, an associate professor of history at the University of Michigan, reminds us: "This is the richest guy anyone has ever seen, that’s the point.
"They’re trying to find words to explain that. There are pictures of him holding a scepter of gold on a throne of gold holding a cup of gold with a golden crown on his head. Imagine as much gold as you think a human being could possess and double it, that’s what all the accounts are trying to communicate."
Other big names to make the all-time rich list include Augustus Caesar, John D. Rockefeller, and Bill Gates. Come on Elon, you're only $160 billion short of topping Mansa Musa.
We're sure you can make that in a couple of weeks if you keep flogging those Tesla Optimus robots.