Travel Guide Nder

Nder, the last capital of the Walo kingdom, is located on the western shore of Lac de Guiers, around 100 km from Saint-Louis. This bush village is best known for its pivotal episode in the fight against slavery. We have to go back in time to the early 19th century. This Wolof monarchy, whose bracks (kings) only turned to Islam at that time, straddled the river. On the Mauritanian side, where the Walo originated, daily life was regularly marred by civil wars and raids by the Trarza Moors, who eventually invaded the entire area on the right bank of the Senegal River. The bracks then crossed the river to settle near Richard-Toll, then further south. In 1819 or 1820, depending on the source, a coalition of Moors, Toucouleurs and Cayorians seized the last Walo capital. A fierce battle ensued, during which it is said that many women preferred to immolate themselves alive rather than surrender to the enemy. Can the heroism of Wolof women still be doubted? The locality, now administratively attached to the rural community of Ross-Béthio, seems to have been forgotten behind its mostly banco houses. It lies at the end of the track after Gnith, on the road to Richard-Toll. It is not on the tourist map of Senegal, and its epic past would be hard to remember without the play Nder en flammes, by Senegalese writer Alioune Badara Bèye (Editions NEAS, 1990).