When the French arrived to colonize Senegal in 1855, the very first resistance they encountered was a woman. Her name: Ndaté Yalla Mboj.
At a time when, in France, women’s citizenship would not be recognized until ninety years later, the French were not a little surprised to discover, in 1855, that this woman with a beautiful face and a powerful build stood at the head of a vast army. To understand the story of this woman of absolute courage, it is necessary to recall who her family was.
Ndaté Yalla came from the Tédiek family, which had grown wealthy over the course of its long reign by accumulating fortune and weapons through trade with French trading posts. It should be noted that in those days, Senegalese sovereigns of the Wolof Kingdoms bore the title of “Brack,” and the mothers or sisters of sovereigns were called “Linguères.” Linguères could succeed sovereigns, and some commanded their own armies.
At the death of Brack Kouly Mbaba Diop in 1816, his cousin, the Linguère Fatim Yamar Khouriaye Mbodj, succeeded him and decided to appoint her husband, Amar Fatim Borso, as Brack of Waalo. This was the first time that a Linguère was also the wife of a Brack. Linguères were trained to lead their people, both politically and militarily. They were trained in the art of warfare and knew how to defend the Kingdom, even in the absence of men. The events of Nder are the best example of this.
On Tuesday, March 7, 1820, the Brack was in the city of Saint-Louis to receive medical treatment, accompanied by the high dignitaries of his court. The warriors of two neighboring states, the Moors, took advantage of his absence to attack the capital, but they quickly retreated in the face of the counterattack led by a group of daring women, armed to the teeth and commanded by Fatim Yamar herself. When the defeated warriors returned home, their wounded pride drove them to come back and overcome these audacious women. This time, the female army could not withstand the men. The Linguère and her companions chose to burn themselves alive rather than face dishonor. Fatim Yamar decided to let her two daughters, aged 10 and 12, Djeumbeut and Ndaté Yalla, escape in order to preserve her lineage. Trained as warriors, the two girls would later rule the Kingdom.
Ndaté Yalla was the last sovereign of Waalo. She succeeded her sister Djeumbeut immediately after the latter’s death on October 1, 1846. She ruled the Kingdom with an iron hand and represented a real threat and a constant source of trouble for the French colonists, whom she firmly resisted.
Normally, when the French signed agreements with the Wolof people, only the names of Bracks appeared on them. But the year Ndaté Yalla ascended the throne, a woman’s signature appeared—and it was hers. The sovereign impressed the French so deeply that they chose to deal exclusively with her, no longer paying attention to the other Bracks of the Wolof Kingdoms. Sometimes, letters sent to the governor bore only Ndaté’s signature. However, Ndaté Yalla was no fool; she knew how to show intelligence and vigilance in the face of the occupiers’ proposals. One passage is remembered from what she wrote to Administrator Faidherbe on May 23, 1851:
“The purpose of this letter is to inform you that the Island of Mboyo has belonged to me from my grandfather down to myself. Today, there is no one who can say that this land belongs to them; it belongs to me alone.”
Ndaté considered herself the sole sovereign of the Kingdom of Waalo. Throughout her reign, she defied the French and fought them in a series of fierce battles. In 1847, she demanded free passage for the Saraoké populations who supplied the Island of Saint-Louis with cattle. In her letter to the governor, she wrote the following:
“It is we who guarantee the passage of the herds through our land; for this reason, we take a tenth of them and we will never accept anything else. Saint-Louis belongs to the Governor, Cayor to the Damel, and Waalo to the Brack. Each of these chiefs governs his country as he sees fit.”
Ndaté did not hesitate to plunder the surroundings of Saint-Louis and to threaten the Governor verbally or through correspondence. The French demanded compensation for the damage caused by the raids, but Ndaté categorically and proudly refused. In this way, she ultimately asserted her rights over the Island of Mboyo and the Island of Sor (present-day city of Saint-Louis).
On November 5, 1850, Ndaté banned all trade in the creeks under her authority and pushed the French to the limits of their tolerance. Faidherbe ordered a battle against the troops of Waalo, who this time were defeated by the enemy’s technological superiority.
After defeating Ndaté Yalla, Faidherbe took her son Sidya, who was only 10 years old, to Saint-Louis to enroll him in the School of Hostages. What Faidherbe did not know was that the child had already received an education similar to that of his mother. The queen had instilled in her son a sense of national pride and a strategist’s mindset from a very young age. The child was sent to the Imperial Lycée of Algiers in 1861, and two years later, he asked Faidherbe to return to Senegal. The latter agreed and baptized the young man Léon, becoming his godfather.
Sidya was only 17 when the French colony entrusted him with command of the canton of Nder. Surprisingly, the young man refused. A nationalist initiated by his mother, Sidya chose to defy the French. He discarded everything he had learned from Europeans and turned instead to the traditions of his people, donning traditional clothing. The queen’s son wore Thiédo braids, more commonly known today as dreadlocks. He vowed never again to speak the colonizers’ language or wear their clothes.
In November 1869, Sidya led a general uprising against the French, resulting in heavy losses for French troops. He was nevertheless relentlessly hunted by the colonial administration, and when he went to Lat Dior to establish a national liberation front, he was betrayed by his own warriors, who handed him over to Governor Valère in Saint-Louis on December 25, 1875. Sidya was deported to Gabon in 1876, where he died in 1878 at the age of 30.
What should we remember about Ndaté Yalla Mboj? A sovereign, a fighter, a resister, a mother, and an educator. And that is exactly how Senegalese people remember Queen Ndaté Yalla Mboj today: an emblematic figure of colonial resistance in Senegal, a Queen and an African Heroine.
