Abstract
Located in the Middle Senegal Valley, Walalde is one of the very few West African first millennium archaeological sites showing an in‐situ Late Stone Age–Iron Age transition. There were two occupation phases: Phase I (800–550 calbce) and Phase II (550–200 calbce). The earliest occupants were iron‐using cattle herders, although it is not yet clear if they produced the iron they used or traded for it. The production of metal became clear during Phase II, as did the use of copper artifacts from Mauritania.