Cape Skiring

Cape Skiring faces the Atlantic near the mouth of the Casamance, a river whose channels wind among mangroves and low-lying fields. Communities of the lower river cultivated rice in a landscape shaped by tides and rain. Dikes protected fields from salt water, while farmers used the rains to wash salt from the soil. Portuguese traders visited the Casamance in the sixteenth century seeking wax, ivory and captives, entering a region already sustained by its own elaborate farming practices.