In various times in history, legend had it that in [far away exotic land...

In various times in history, legend had it that in [far away exotic land, probably in Africa or the Far East] the king is so rich that all the beggars who ask for it are fed, clothed and washed for free in his city/palace.

Let's say we want to introduce a detail like that into a game. This is meant to show that the exotic king is absurdly wealthy, of course, but nobody is INFINITELY rich. How much should each beggar receive for free from the king's compassion to awe the players with the king's wealth without it breaking the believably of the setting (I mean, there are a lot of beggars, you can't have them all actually living like kings)?

>are fed, clothed and washed for free
That doesn't really sounds like much. The real question should be, how long will this wealthy king keep up with this? Because if this turns out to be true, all the beggars that can will try to get to him. And after these three days their situation hasn't really improved, so they will knock on the kings door again. At some point the city might be flooded with beggars that do nothing but life on the expense of the king.

I'm assuming that's why that didn't actually happen in real life and was used as a tall tale to exaggerate the impossible wealth of faraway kingdoms (then again, it's said that Mansa Musa just about singlehandedly collapsed the economy of the Middle East and kickstarted the Italian Renaissance by accident just by dumping so much gold into the region on a trip to Mecca, so who knows).

I live in Sweden and this post made me sad because it's true.

I think the key element to remember here is that unlike with, say, modern day Germany, people back then were severely limited in their mobility. Even if everyone in the world knew how good life was in your city, getting there from anywhere but the immediate surroundings would've been difficult enough to limit the amount of immigrants to manageability (especially since we're assuming these are the poor and sick, not people who can afford to carry a lot of supplies on top of a caravan of camels or sail in a big ship). And assuming an African locale, as those stories tended to, they'd also likely need to cross either a desert and/or a jungle. Most wouldn't make it.

What would happen is that the city/palace would get a permanent population of beggars, consisting of everyone who lived close enough by to actually get there, with newcomers being rare enough that they'd hardly ever make such a number as to strain the economy.

>How much should each beggar receive for free from the king's compassion to awe the players with the king's wealth without it breaking the believably of the setting
Nothing. Already ensuring that nobody ever goes hungry in an entire kingdom should be more than enough to show the extravagant wealth of that realm (by medieval standards). The many fountains in various major cities constantly sprout fresh water that anyone can scoop up to bathe or drink at will, local representatives of the king hand out excess bread to everyone, and everyone is well fed enough to keep working to enhance the already extravagant wealth of the realm. That should sound nice enough, right?

Not only that, but rulers back then weren't keen on allowing everyone and their mother in. Even with increased mobility, such a realm would most likely have a migration policy akin to that of Japan, a country that's still 95% homogenous and whose most present immigrants are the Chinese and Koreans (neighbors from compatible cultures).

I don't remember who it was or where or when exactly, but I read about a certain kingdom in medieval Africa (around Tunisia I think?) and I distinctly remember the imagery of "dates and figs" being given to the poor by the king's men every morning. Presumably those were very plentiful.

Man, the series took a nosedive after 3.

Would this be every day? Because it could be once a month, once a year, a show of royal generosity. Or it could be for pilgrims coming for a cerimony of some kind.

Besides, I assume the clothes and food are good for peasant standards, not stuff like silk. Salted fish, bread and cabbage, plus a linen tunic and fiber sandals.

About the bath, a large stepwell fed by qanats would do to wash thousands. Or people could spend one hour inside the cold room.

Mansa Musa. On his way to Mecca, he spent so much gold it crippled the local economies. He donated four tons of gold to the mendicants. He regreted doing this and borrowed lots of gold in the way back.

The guy was so fucking rich he controled the mediterranean price of gold without meaning to

This comes from, among many, the travel accounts of Ibn Batutta, an african traveler and explorer just like Marco Polo. Fun read, specially the naked princesses of Timbuktu. The region had the kind of syncretism between Islam and local beliefs that we see with Candomble nowadays.

He also was one of the people medieval europe thought of as Prester John, after the mongols proved to be a let down.

They are mostly arab, but there are many separate accounts of him. It was no less extraordinary at the time than to us now.

> Republicans write fantasy