History
The existence of the Senegal River was known to the early Mediterranean civilizations. It was called Bambotus by Pliny the Elder (from Phoenician "behemoth" for hippopotamus) and Nias by Claudius Ptolemy. It was visited by Hanno the Carthaginian around 450 BCE at his navigation from Carthage through the pillars of Herakles to Theon Ochema (Mount Cameroon) in the Gulf of Guinea. There was trade from here to the Mediterranean World, until the destruction of Carthage and its west African trade net in 146 BCE.
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
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