Île de Gorée is one of the 19 communes d'arrondissement (i.e. districts) of the city of Dakar, Senegal. It is a 0.182 square kilometres (45 acres) island located 2 kilometres (1.1 nmi; 1.2 mi) at sea from the main harbor of Dakar (14°40′0″N 17°24′0″W).
Its population as of 31 January 2005 official estimates is 1,056 inhabitants, giving a density of 5,802 inh. per km² (15,028 inh. per sq. mile), which is only half the average density of the city of Dakar. Gorée is both the smallest and the least populated of the 19 communes d'arrondissement of Dakar.Gorée is famous as a destination for people interested in the Atlantic slave trade but relatively few slaves were processed or transported from there. The more important centres for the slave trade from Senegal were north, at Saint-Louis, Senegal, or to the south in the Gambia, at the mouths of major rivers for trade.
Gorée is a small island 900 metres/3,000 feet in length and 350 metres/1,165 feet in width sheltered by the Cape Vert Peninsula. Now part of the city of Dakar, it was a minor port and site of uropean settlement along the coast. Being almost devoid of drinking water, the island was not settled before the arrival of Europeans. The Portuguese were the first to establish a presence on Gorée ( circa 1450 CE/AD ), where they built a small stone chapel and used land as a cemetery.Gorée is known as the location of the House of Slaves (French: Maison des esclaves), built by an Afro-French Métis family about 1780–1784. The House of Slaves is one of the oldest houses on the island. It is now used as a tourist destination to show the horrors of the slave trade throughout the Atlantic world.Gorée was relatively unimportant in the slave trade. The claim that the "house of slaves" was a slave-shipping point was refuted in 1959 by Raymond Mauny, who shortly afterward was appointed the first professor of African history at the Sorbonne.
Source:
Picture: | Link:
Wikipedia: | Link:
PLACE YOUR AD CODE HERE
0 comments:
Post a Comment