Senegal

From Takrur to a poet's republic

On the westernmost edge of Africa, Senegal grew from the Islamic state of Takrur and the Wolof empire of Jolof into a mosaic of kingdoms, then into the cornerstone of French West Africa. Its coast — Saint-Louis, Gorée, Dakar — anchored centuries of Atlantic trade, including the slave trade. Independent since 1960 under the poet-president Léopold Sédar Senghor, Senegal has become one of Africa's steadiest democracies, even as a separatist conflict in the southern Casamance ran for four decades.