Editing Dakar (section)

== History ==
{{For timeline}}
The [[Cap-Vert]] peninsula was settled no later than the 15th century, by the [[Lebu people]], an aquacultural subgroup of the Wolof ethnic group. The original villages—Ouakam, Ngor, [[Yoff]] and Hann—still constitute distinctively [[Lebou]] neighborhoods of the city today. In 1444, the [[Kingdom of Portugal|Portuguese]] reached the Bay of Dakar.<ref>[[Dinis Dias]] doubled Cap-Vert in 1444, but it is unclear if he sailed into the bay itself. [[Álvaro Fernandes]] anchored at the uninhabited island of Goree and lured and captured two natives off a Lebou fishing canoe before being driven off. The large slaving fleet of [[Lançarote de Freitas]] anchored in the bay, but their attempts to reach the mainland shore were fended off by missile fire and took no captives. The subsequent fleets of Estêvão Afonso (1446) and Valarte (1447) stopped briefly at Goree, but were also fended off the shores and took no captives. In the aftermath, Prince [[Henry the Navigator]] suspended all Portuguese expeditions beyond Cap-Vert for nearly a decade. There are no more recorded attempts until contact was made in 1456. (As reported in the 1453 chronicle of [[Gomes Eanes de Zurara]])</ref><ref>B.W. Diffie and G.D. Winius (1977) ''Foundations of the Portuguese empire, 1415–1580'' Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, pp.83-85</ref><ref>A. Teixeira da Mota (1946) "A descoberta da Guiné", ''Boletim cultural da Guiné Portuguesa'', Vol. 1. No. 2 (Apr), p. 273-326.</ref> Peaceful contact was finally opened in 1456 by [[Diogo Gomes]], and the bay was subsequently referred to as the "''Angra de Bezeguiche''" (after the name of the local ruler).<ref name=mota>A. Teixeira da Mota (1968) "Ilha de Santiago e Angra de Bezeguiche, escalas da carreira da India", ''Do tempo e da historia'', Lisbon, v.3, pp.141-49.</ref>  The bay of "Bezeguiche" would go on to serve as a critical stop for the [[Portuguese India Armadas]] of the early 16th century, where large fleets would routinely stop, both on their outward and return journeys from India, to repair, collect fresh water from the rivulets and wells along the Cap-Vert shore and trade for provisions with the local people for their remaining voyage.<ref name=mota /> (It was famously during [[2nd Portuguese India Armada (Cabral, 1500)#Conference at Bezeguiche|one of these stops]], in 1501, where the Florentine navigator [[Amerigo Vespucci]] began to construct his "[[New World]]" hypothesis about America.<ref>Vespucci's letter from Bezeguiche is reproduced in F.A. de Varnhagen (1865) ''Amerigo Vespucci'', pp.78-82.</ref>)

The Portuguese eventually founded a settlement on the island of [[Gorée]] (then known as the island of Bezeguiche or Palma), which by 1536 they began to use as a base for slave exportation. The mainland of Cap-Vert, however, was under control of the [[Jolof Empire]], as part of the western province of [[Cayor]] which seceded from Jolof in its own right in 1549. A new Lebou village, called Ndakaaru, was established directly across from Gorée in the 17th century to service the European [[trading factory]] with food and drinking water. Gorée was captured by the [[Dutch Republic|United Netherlands]] in 1588, which gave it its present name (spelled ''Goeree'', after [[Goeree-Overflakkee]] in the Netherlands).{{citation needed|date=December 2021}} The island switched hands between the Portuguese and Dutch several more times before falling to the English under [[Robert Holmes (admiral)|Admiral Robert Holmes]] on January 23, 1664, and finally to the French in 1677. Though under continuous French administration since, multiracial people, descended from Dutch and French traders and African wives, dominated the slave trade. The infamous "[[House of Slaves]]" was built at Gorée in 1776.

In 1795, the Lebou of Cape Verde revolted against Cayor rule. A new theocratic state, subsequently called the "Lebou Republic" by the French, was established under the leadership of the Diop, a Muslim clerical family originally from Koki in Cayor. The capital of the republic was established at Ndakaaru. In 1857, the French established a military post at Ndakaaru (which they called "Dakar") and annexed the Lebou Republic, though its institutions continued to function nominally. The Serigne (also spelled Sëriñ, "Lord") of Ndakaaru is still recognized as the traditional political authority of the Lebou by the Senegalese State today.{{citation needed|date=December 2021}}

The slave trade was abolished by France in February 1794. However, [[Napoleon Bonaparte]] reinstated the slave trade in May 1802. The slave trade continued at Gorée until 1848, when it was finally abolished throughout all French territories. To replace trade in slaves, the French promoted peanut cultivation on the mainland. As the peanut trade boomed, tiny Gorée Island, whose population had grown to 6,000&nbsp;residents, proved ineffectual as a port. Traders from Gorée decided to move to the mainland and a "factory" with warehouses was established in [[Rufisque]] in 1840.{{citation needed|date=December 2021}}

[[File:061 Dakar. - Une fontaine publique.jpg|left|thumb|A public water well, 1899]]
Large public expenditure for infrastructure was allocated by the colonial authorities to Dakar's development. The port facilities were improved with jetties, a telegraph line was established along the coast to [[Saint-Louis, Senegal|Saint-Louis]] and the [[Dakar-Saint-Louis railway]] was completed in 1885, at which point the city became an important base for the conquest of the [[Western Sudan]].

Gorée, including Dakar, was recognised as a French ''commune'' in 1872. Dakar itself was split off from Gorée as a separate ''commune'' in 1887. The citizens of the city elected their own mayor and municipal council, and helped send an elected representative to the [[National Assembly (France)|National Assembly]] in Paris. Dakar replaced Saint-Louis as the capital of [[French West Africa]] in 1902.<ref>Roman Adrian Cybriwsky, ''Capital Cities around the World: An Encyclopedia of Geography, History, and Culture'', ABC-CLIO, US, 2013, p. 93</ref> A second major railroad, the [[Dakar-Niger railway|Dakar-Niger]] built from 1906 to 1923, linked Dakar to Bamako and consolidated the city's position at the head of France's West African empire.{{citation needed|date=December 2021}} In 1929, the ''commune'' of Gorée Island, now with only a few hundred inhabitants, was merged into Dakar.

[[File:057 Dakar. - Les entrepôts.jpg|thumb|left|Dakar Entrepôt. {{Circa|1900}}]]

Urbanization during the colonial period was marked by forms of racial and social segregation—often expressed in terms of health and hygiene—which continue to structure the city today. Following a plague epidemic in 1914, the authorities forced most of the African population out of old neighborhoods, or "Plateau", and into a new quarter, called Médina, separated from it by a "sanitary cordon". As first occupants of the land, the Lebou inhabitants of the city successfully resisted this expropriation. They were supported by [[Blaise Diagne]], the first African to be elected Deputy to the National Assembly. Nonetheless, the Plateau thereafter became an administrative, commercial, and residential district increasingly reserved for Europeans and served as model for similar exclusionary administrative enclaves in French Africa's other colonial capitals (Bamako, Conakry, Abidjan, Brazzaville). Meanwhile, the Layene Sufi order, established by [[Seydina Mouhammadou Limamou Laye]], was thriving among the Lebou in Yoff and in a new village called Cambérène. Since independence, urbanization has sprawled eastward past Pikine, a commuter suburb whose population (2001 est. 1,200,000) is greater than that of Dakar proper, to Rufisque, creating a [[conurbation]] of almost 3&nbsp;million (over a quarter of the national population).{{citation needed|date=December 2021}}

[[File:Harbor, Dakar, Sénégal (West Africa), c. 1905 (7792576026).jpg|thumb|Harbor Dakar, 1905]]

In its colonial heyday Dakar was one of the major cities of the French Empire, comparable to [[Hanoi]] or [[Beirut]].{{citation needed|date=December 2021}} French trading firms established branch offices there and industrial investments (mills, breweries, refineries, canneries) were attracted by its port and rail facilities. It was also strategically important to France, which maintained an important naval base and coaling station in its harbor, and which integrated it into its earliest air force and airmail circuits, most notably with the legendary Mermoz airfield (no longer extant).

{{Main|Battle of Dakar}}
In 1940, Dakar became involved in the [[WW II|Second World War]] when [[Charles de Gaulle|General de Gaulle]], leader of the [[Free France|Free French]] Forces, sought to make the city the base of his resistance operations. The object was to raise the Free French flag in West Africa, to occupy Dakar and thus start to consolidate the French resistance of its colonies in Africa. The plan had British naval support when fighting alone against the Axis powers. However, due to delays and the plan becoming known, Dakar had already come under the influence of the German controlled will of the [[Vichy France|Vichy government]]. With the arrival of French naval forces under Vichy control and faced by stubborn defences onshore, de Gaulle's proposals were resisted, and the Battle of Dakar ensued off the coast lasting three days 23–25 September 1940, between the Vichy defences and the attack of the Free French and British navy. The enterprise was abandoned after appreciable naval losses. Although the initiative on Dakar failed, General de Gaulle was able to establish himself at [[Douala]] in the Cameroons which became the rallying point for the resistance of the Free French cause.<ref>Winston Churchill, ''The Second World War'', Vol 2 Book II Chapter xxiv 'Dakar'.</ref><ref>John Williams, ''The Guns of Dakar: September, 1940'' (Heinemann Educational Books, 1976).</ref><ref>Martin Thomas, "The Anglo‐French divorce over West Africa and the limitations of strategic planning, June‐December 1940." ''Diplomacy and Statecraft'' 6.1 (1995): 252-278.</ref>

[[File:Thiaroye Mural DSCN1029.jpg|thumb|Mural in Dakar commemorating the [[Thiaroye massacre]]. It reads "Thiaroye '44, an unforgettable event".]]
In November 1944, West African conscripts in the French army mutinied against poor conditions at the Thiaroye camp, on the outskirts of the city. The mutiny was seen as an indictment of the colonial system and constituted a watershed for the nationalist movement. On 1 December 1944, French soldiers guarding the camp [[Thiaroye massacre|opened fire on the West African soldiers]]. Accounts of the death toll range from around 35 (the official French account) to over 300 (army veterans active at the time).

Dakar was the capital of the short-lived [[Mali Federation]] from 1959 to 1960, after which it became the capital of Senegal. The poet, philosopher and first President of [[Senegal]] [[Léopold Sédar Senghor]] tried to transform Dakar into the "Sub-Saharan African Athens" (l'Athènes de l'Afrique subsaharienne),<ref>{{cite web |title=Discours de réception de M. Jean-Claude JUNCKER comme membre associé étranger à l'Académie des Sciences morales et politiques |language=fr |url=http://www.geopolitis.net/DOCUMENTS%20SELECTIONNES/DISCOURSJUNCKER.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130724071029/http://www.geopolitis.net/DOCUMENTS%20SELECTIONNES/DISCOURSJUNCKER.pdf |archive-date=2013-07-24 |url-status=dead }}</ref> as his vision was for it.

Dakar is a major financial centre, home to a dozen national and regional banks (including the [[Central Bank of West African States]] (BCEAO) which manages the unified [[West African CFA franc]] currency), and to numerous international organizations, NGOs and international research centers. Dakar has a large [[Lebanese people in Senegal|Lebanese community]] (concentrated in the import-export sector) that dates to the 1920s, a community of Moroccan businesspeople, as well as Mauritanian, [[Cape Verdeans in Senegal|Cape Verdean]], and Guinean communities. The city is home to as many as 20,000&nbsp;French expatriates.{{citation needed|date=December 2021}} France still maintains an air force base at Yoff and the French fleet is serviced in Dakar's port.

Beginning 1978 and until 2007, Dakar was frequently the ending point of the [[Dakar Rally]].