Ibn Battuta visited Suleyman (mansa) in Gao in 1352–53, when the town formed part of the Mali Empire. He arrived by boat from Timbuktu on his return journey from visiting the capital of the Empire:Then I travelled to the town of Kawkaw, which is a great town on the Nīl , one of the finest, biggest, and most fertile cities of the Sūdān. There is much rice there, and milk, and chickens, and fish, and the cucumber, which has no like. Its people conduct their buying and selling with cowries, like the people of Mālī.