The Republic of The Gambia is a country in Western Africa. It is the smallest country on the African continental mainland and is bordered to the north, east, and south by ► Senegal, and has a small coast on the Atlantic Ocean in the west. The River Gambia flows through the centre of the country and empties into the Atlantic Ocean. On 18 February 1965, The Gambia became independent from the British Empire. Banjul is its capital.
Short name
The Gambia
Official name
Republic of The Gambia
Status
Independent country since 1965
Location
West Africa
Capital
Banjul
Population
1,857,181 inhabitants
Area
10,380 square kilometres (4,010 sq mi)
Major languages
English (official), Wolof, Fula, Mandinka, Serer, and Jola
This section holds a short summary of the history of the area of present-day The Gambia, illustrated with maps, including historical maps of former countries and empires that included present-day The Gambia.
The WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Atlas of the World is an organized and commented collection of geographical, political and historical maps available at Wikimedia Commons. The main page is therefore the portal to maps and cartography on Wikimedia. That page contains links to entries by country, continent and by topic as well as general notes and references.
Every entry has an introduction section in English. If other languages are native and/or official in an entity, introductions in other languages are added in separate sections. The text of the introduction(s) is based on the content of the Wikipedia encyclopedia. For sources of the introduction see therefore the Wikipedia entries linked to. The same goes for the texts in the history sections.
Historical maps are included in the continent, country and dependency entries.
The status of various entities is disputed. See the content for the entities concerned.
The maps of former countries that are more or less continued by a present-day country or had a territory included in only one or two countries are included in the atlas of the present-day country. For example the Ottoman Empire can be found in the Atlas of Turkey.
