Kahone or Kawon is a town and commune near Kaolack,

Senegal Senegal,; Wolof: ''Senegaal''; Pulaar: 𞤅𞤫𞤲𞤫𞤺𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭 (Senegaali); Arabic: السنغال ''As-Sinighal'') officially the Republic of Senegal,; Wolof: ''Réewum Senegaal''; Pulaar : 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 ...

. It is primarily agricultural, but it is participating in industrial development plans. Also, the town is pursuing increased tourism based on its ancient Serer culture. Kahone is the royal seat of the Serer Kingdom of Saloum which has ruled there since the 15th century after the Gelwar's defeat in c. 1335, and centuries previous to that. Kahone was originally a far more important town than Kaolack, but the roles have been reversed in recent years, and Kahone has been reduced to a sub-prefecture of Kaolack. An annual royal festival is celebrated in which the O Maad (Serer king), Djaraaf (Serer prime minister) and other dignitaries meet to decide kingdom issues and hold pageants celebrating the history of Saloum and the

Serer people The Serer people are a West African ethnoreligious group.

. There is a

mosque A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers ( sujud) are performed, ...

thanks to the Wolof and Fula

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

settlers and a

Catholic missions Missionary work of the Catholic Church has often been undertaken outside the geographically defined parishes and dioceses by religious orders who have people and material resources to spare, and some of which specialized in missions. Eventually, ...

in Kahone. There are numerous ancient tombs, stone circles and megaliths in the vicinity as well as large burial mounds implanted with

baobab ''Adansonia'' is a genus made up of eight species of medium-to-large deciduous trees known as baobabs ( or ). They are placed in the Malvaceae family, subfamily Bombacoideae. They are native to Madagascar, mainland Africa, and Australia.T ...

trees. Kahone is routinely involved in many administrative territorial disputes with neighboring communes, always emphasizing its earlier importance. In 2007, according to official estimates, Kahone had 5,852 inhabitants.

Sources

* Henry Gravrand, ''La civilisation sereer'', I. Coosan, Dakar, Nouvelles Editions Africaines (1983). In French. *

Martin A. Klein Martin A. Klein (born 1934 in suburban New York City) is an Africanist and an emeritus professor in the History Department at the University of Toronto specialising in the Atlantic slave trade, and francophone West Africa: Senegal, Guinea, ...

, ''Islam and Imperialism in Senegal Sine-Saloum, 1847–1914'', Edinburgh At the University Press (1968) * Alioune Sarr, ''Histoire du Sine-Saloum. Introduction, bibliographie et Notes par Charles Becker'', BIFAN, Tome 46, Serie B, n° 3–4, 1986-1987. In French.

Sources

See also