The Senegal River & the South

The Hodh and its cliffs were settled long before the Sahara reached its present extent: stone-walled villages along the escarpments of the Dhar Oualata and Dhar Néma were built by farming and herding communities from around 2000 BC. The region later lay at the northern edge of the Ghana empire of the Soninke, and the ruins at Koumbi Saleh may be those of its capital. Awdaghust, an important trade town at Tegdaoust in Hodh el Gharbi, was taken by the Almoravids in 1054. Oualata rose as the southern terminus of the caravan route and was visited by Ibn Battuta in the 14th century.

Along the Senegal river, the kingdom of Tekrur and its successor, the Futa Toro of the Halpulaar, ruled both banks; the Islamic revolution of 1776 set up an almamate there. Moorish emirates, Brakna among them, dominated the north bank and traded gum arabic with European merchants.

French forces moved up the river in the 19th century and made the valley part of Mauritania in the early 1900s, drawing the border along the river. After independence, tensions between the Moorish state and the valley's Afro-Mauritanians grew, and in 1989 a crisis with Senegal led to the expulsion of many black Mauritanians across the river. The droughts of the 1970s and 1980s emptied much of the Hodh's pastures. Since 2012 the Mbera camp near Bassikounou has sheltered refugees from the war in Mali.

The river valley is the heartland of Mauritania's Afro-Mauritanian peoples. Halpulaar (Toucouleur and Fulani) communities dominate around Kaédi and Boghé, speaking Pulaar and tracing their identity to the Futa Toro; the Soninke of Guidimaka, heirs to the Ghana empire, are known for their emigration, and many villages are sustained by relatives in France. Wolof is spoken towards the delta. Further north and east, in Brakna, Assaba and the Hodh, Moorish Bidhan and Haratin herding and farming communities predominate, speaking Hassaniya.

Oualata is famous for its house decoration: women paint doorways, niches and inner walls with decorative motifs, renewed after each rainy season. Kiffa gave its name to beads of powdered glass made by women to secret recipes, a craft now almost lost.

Religious life follows Sufi brotherhoods, the Tijaniyya and Qadiriyya, and the Quranic schools of the valley and the Hodh have trained scholars for centuries. The memory of 1989, the question of land along the river, and the lasting legacy of slavery shape local politics, and the relationship with Senegal, across the water, remains close and personal, with families spread over both banks.

This is Mauritania's farming region. Kaédi, the capital of Gorgol, is the largest river town, with Boghé, Aleg, the capital of Brakna, and Sélibaby in Guidimaka; Kiffa, Ayoun el Atrous and Néma are the market towns of the interior, spread along the Route de l'Espoir.

The river valley grows irrigated rice on large schemes and, as the flood recedes, sorghum, maize, beans and vegetables on the damp soils of the walo, the floodplain. Dams built by the countries sharing the river, at Diama and Manantali, now regulate its flow. Further east the economy rests on livestock: herds of cattle, sheep, goats and camels move between wells and pastures, and animals are driven or trucked to markets as far as Senegal. Remittances, particularly from France to Guidimaka, keep many villages going.

Life is rural and organised around the season: planting when the rains come, the harvest in autumn, and the long dry season when men often leave for work in Nouakchott or abroad. Water shortages, poor roads, drought and the arrival of refugees and herders from Mali are constant pressures.

The river valley eats like its neighbours in Senegal and Mali. Rice with fish and vegetables in tomato sauce is the midday meal, and millet is steamed into a fine couscous, eaten with meat or vegetable sauce, or cooked into a thick porridge with soured milk. Mafé, a stew of meat in groundnut sauce, is common, and fish from the Senegal river is grilled, fried or dried for the lean months.

In the Moorish areas of Brakna, Assaba and the Hodh, the diet is based on milk and meat: fresh and soured milk, zrig, the fermented-milk drink, goat and mutton stews with rice or millet couscous, and camel meat. Méchoui, a whole roast lamb, marks weddings and Eid al-Adha, when every family that can afford it slaughters a sheep.

Wild foods matter in the Sahel: the leaves and fruit of the baobab are used in sauces and drinks, and hibiscus flowers are brewed into a cold red drink. Green tea with mint, brewed three times, is served everywhere.

Kaédi sits on the Senegal river in a plain of rice fields, with a lively market and a regional hospital of brick domes by Fabrizio Carola, and villages of the Halpulaar lie along the banks upstream and down. Rosso, the ferry town downstream where the main road crosses into Senegal, lies administratively in neighbouring Trarza. Aleg, the capital of Brakna, lies on Lake Aleg.

In Assaba, Kiffa is a busy crossroads market town known for its glass beads. To the south, the Sahel villages of Guidimaka cluster around Sélibaby in a landscape of low hills, gum trees and millet fields that turns green in the rainy season.

To the east lie the Hodh plains, a vast country of sand and scrub crossed by camel herders. Néma, at the end of the paved road, stands below the escarpment of the Dhar Néma, and from there a track leads to Oualata, a UNESCO World Heritage Site with painted houses and a manuscript museum. The ruins of Koumbi Saleh south of Timbédra and of Tegdaoust in Hodh el Gharbi recall the medieval trade across the Sahara.