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The Sénégal River is a 1790 km long river in West Africa, that forms the border between Senegal and Mauritania. It was called Bambotus by Pliny the Elder (from phoenician "behemoth" for hippopotamus) and Nias by Claudius Ptolemy. It was visited by Hanno the Carthaginian around 450 BC at his navigation from Carthage through the pillars of Herakles to Theon Ochema (Mount Cameroon) in the Gulf of Guinea. There was probably trade from here to the Mediterranean World, until the destruction of Carthage and its west African trade net in 146 BC.