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Archaeological finds on the Cape Verde Peninsula and from the upper Senegal Valley prove that present-day Senegal was already settled in the Acheuléen. Numerous remains of the country's earliest inhabitants are thought to have been found throughout the country, but overall the prehistory of Senegal is poorly understood. Neolithic and Iron Age megaliths, burial mounds, and shell islands survive on the coasts. The oral history of the Wolof and Serer people attributes this to a people called Soose, who are said to have inhabited the region at that time. What is certain is that the population at that time lived in villages, practiced agriculture and cattle breeding as well as fishing.
The West African Kingdoms
The introduction of ironworking also brought social upheaval. As a result, states emerged; the first historically documented state on the territory of present-day Senegal was Takrur. It emerged at about the same time as Gao and Ghana to the east; the latter developed in the 9th century into an empire that extended to the Senegal River. Takrur, however, in all probability remained independent. Around 1050, the Almoravids began religiously motivated campaigns in what is now Mauritania. They created an empire that stretched from Spain to the southern edge of the Sahara. Whether Takrur became part of this empire is not clear. However, the influence of the Almoravids strengthened ties to Islam; the first king of Takrur to profess Islam was War Jaabi.
In the 13th century, the state of Jolof emerged in the lower Senegal delta. This state was much more centralized than Takrur and expanded rapidly towards the south. However, dominance of the region was lost to the Mali Empire shortly thereafter. Takrur and Jolof became tributary to Mali, and Casamance and present-day Gambia became directly part of the Mali Empire as provinces. They allowed the empire coastal trade and perhaps even ocean exploration. The Mali Empire experienced the height of its power in the 14th century; thereafter, the western parts of the Mandinka Empire formed into the state of Gabu, while Jolof held its own north of the Gambia River.
In 1444, the first Portuguese ship reached the coast off what is now Senegal. The Portuguese were mainly interested in trading African gold, bypassing the Arabs. In the following centuries, the trade was carried on by lançados, descendants of Portuguese sailors and African women. Communities of Lançados existed in numerous places along the African coast; however, these were not initially colonies. Towards the end of the 15th century, a strong northern migration of Tukulor took place, which finally destroyed the state of Takrur and caused Jolof to break up into several kingdoms, namely Waalo, Cayor, Baol, Sine and Saloum. These states were all unstable; nobles, kings and members of the warrior caste of the old Mali Empire fought for influence.
To the middle of the 15th century also goes back the first sure proof of the name Senega both for the river and for the country lying beside it, which is possibly identical with the name of the Berber tribal group of the Sanhādscha.
Colonial Times
The instability of the states of what is now Senegal was exacerbated by the slave trade. From the 17th century onwards, the Portuguese trader network was replaced by fortified French, Dutch and British colonies, mostly on islands off the mainland. Warlike conflicts between states now increasingly involved the acquisition of captives. Although slavery was a feature of traditional societies, the number of people carried off to the Americas had a devastating effect on the demography of the region. When the slave trade came to a halt, native rulers in turn struggled to compensate for the loss of revenue. The result was a series of Islamic revolutions from 1673 to 1888 that overthrew kings and attempted to establish Islamic states. Most of these revolutions failed because the monarchs were supported by the French with firearms.
The French had established colonies, especially in Saint Louis and Gorée, which were formally subordinate to governors of the trading companies. However, circumstances prevented administrative structures from being established. Actual power in these centres was thus slowly taken over by the Métis (French: "mongrels") ethnic group, who controlled trade with the hinterland. For example, the Métis refused to implement the ban on slavery enacted in the wake of the French Revolution; this did not officially happen until 1848. The Métis also developed new trading activities, such as first the export of rubber and later massive exports of peanuts.
By 1891, the entire territory of present-day Senegal came under French control. The kingdoms were replaced by cantons, which were headed by nobles according to the traditional system, but who could exert little influence. The French exploited the significantly stronger influence of the emerging Sufi orders for the purpose of spreading peanut cultivation to their liking. The quatre communes of Saint Louis, Gorée, Rufisque, and Dakar were communes with full French citizenship from 1848. Here, society developed along French lines: newspapers, political parties and trade unions emerged; elections were held and in 1914 Blaise Diagne was elected the first African representative of the quatre communes in the French parliament. In 1902 Dakar became the capital of the Confederation Afrique Occidentale Française (AOF), founded in 1895.
The emerging emancipation movements were further strengthened by the two world wars in which Senegalese troops were deployed on the French side. On 19 February 1945, under the French colonial administration, a decree was issued stating that there was no difference between Senegalese and French women in active and passive female suffrage; they were voters and eligible under the same conditions. In 1956, still under French colonial rule, the loi-cadre Defferre was introduced, which guaranteed universal adult suffrage. When the country was independent in 1960, this right was confirmed.
The politician who was best able to unite the opposites of the people in the European-oriented cities and the religiously conservative rural population was Léopold Sédar Senghor. He managed to form a coalition that united socialists from Lamine Guèye to the caliph of the Murid order, Falilou Mbacké. When the AOF was dissolved in 1960, many leaders rejected the breakup of West Africa into small nation-states. Consequently, the country achieved independence along with present-day Mali as the Mali Federation on June 20, 1960. Just 2 months later, however, Senghor and Modibo Keita fell out and the two states went their separate ways. Senghor was elected the country's first president on September 5, 1960.
Since independence
After independence, a model of government was introduced in the Republic of Senegal that was very much based on France: to this day, Senegal is a highly centralized presidential republic. The three personalities who dominated the first years of independence were President Léopold Sédar Senghor, Parliamentary Speaker Lamine Guèye and Prime Minister Mamadou Dia. The latter began an ambitious reform program in economic and political matters; however, he was accused of planning a coup as early as 1962 and arrested.
After this political crisis, a new constitution was adopted in 1963, which strengthened the rights of the president; at the same time, Senegal effectively became a one-party state, so that in 1965 only the Union progressiste sénégalaise of the president was allowed. Senghor primarily pursued a visionary cultural policy in which the state financed festivals, studios, and museums. During the same period, however, the price of the country's main export, peanuts, began to fall, and a series of droughts brought a further decline in production. The resulting drop in government revenue led to serious social tensions. In the face of the crisis, the political system was liberalized again, the opposition party Parti Démocratique Sénégalais was admitted in 1974, and in 1980 Senghor became the first African head of state to abdicate, handing over office to Abdou Diouf.
Diouf's tenure was marked above all by armed conflicts, both internal and external, and a steady economic decline. The implementation of reforms demanded by Senegal's creditors brought privatization and the end of subsidies, which sharply increased the cost of living for the people. In 1981/82, Senegal sent its army to The Gambia to assist President Dawda Jawara in a military coup. However, the Senegambia Confederation that was subsequently formed did not have a long life. Further, the Casamance conflict erupted in 1982, with the separatist movement Mouvement des forces démocratiques de la Casamance at its head. Disputes over grazing and water use rights on the Senegal River eventually led to a border war with Mauritania in 1989 that claimed 400 lives and forced numerous people on both sides of the border to return to their homeland. Following a military coup in neighboring Guinea-Bissau, Senegal and Guinea deployed troops in June 1998.
After all rounds of elections in the 1980s and 1990s had led to strong domestic tensions, the year 2000 saw the first peaceful transfer of power south of the Sahara: Abdoulaye Wade won the presidential elections and, a year later, his party also won the parliamentary elections. In January 2001, the constitution was amended by referendum. The presidential term was limited to a maximum of two 5-year terms. Wade's policies were aimed at liberalization, investment friendliness, and promotion of telecommunications and tourism, but success has been elusive. At the same time, Wade was increasingly accused of clientelism and wastefulness; the purchasing power of Senegalese continued to decline and young people in particular turned away from his policies.
In Senegal's 2012 presidential election, challenger Macky Sall defeated incumbent Wade in a runoff.
