History of Senegal

The history of Senegal encompasses its precolonial states and societies, French conquest and colonial rule, independence in 1960, and development as a modern republic.

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Ghana Empire: A medieval West African state whose power rested on trans-Saharan trade in gold and salt. Its regional influence preceded the states that emerged in the western Sahel.
French West Africa: A federation of French colonial territories in West Africa that existed from 1895 to 1958. Senegal served as its administrative center and most politically influential territory.
Léopold Sédar Senghor: A poet, politician, and Senegal's first president, who served from independence until 1980. He led the new republic and promoted Négritude as a cultural and political vision.
Independence of Senegal: Senegal's emergence as a sovereign state in 1960 after the dissolution of the Mali Federation. It established the republic whose subsequent political history defines the postcolonial era.
Jolof Empire: A Wolof-led state that dominated much of Senegambia from the fourteenth to the sixteenth century. Its political legacy helps explain the region's precolonial Wolof kingdoms.
French conquest of Senegal: The nineteenth-century military and political expansion that brought Senegalese territories under French control. Conquest proceeded through campaigns and unequal treaties with local states.
Mamadou Dia: A Senegalese politician who served as prime minister from 1959 to 1962 and advocated rapid economic transformation. His conflict with Senghor exposed competing visions for governing after independence.
Mali Federation: A short-lived federation of Senegal and French Sudan that became independent from France in 1960. Its rapid breakup shaped the form and timing of Senegalese independence.
Kingdom of Waalo: A precolonial kingdom in the lower Senegal River valley, ruled by a lineage of queens and kings. Its location made it an early arena of trade and French expansion.
Samori Ture: A West African military leader who built the Wassoulou Empire and resisted French expansion. His resistance shows how French conquest unfolded across the wider region.