Bethanie (Namibia)

Village Bethanie ǀUiǂgandes ( naq ) Bethanien ( deu )
Details Details
Schmelenhaus in Bethanien
motto	-
Basic data
Population Area Population Density	3900 ( 2012 estimate )
State Region Constituency	Namibia ǁKaras Berseba
Establishment date	around 1804
License plate phone code	B 63
Website	Website

The Lutheran Lentia Church in Bethanie

Bethanie ( Afrikaans and official) (in German and historically Bethanien ; in Nama ǀUiǂgandes ) is a village in the RegionKaras region in southern Namibia . It has (as of 2013) around 3900 inhabitants, is 1000 meters high and is located near the B4 national road between Keetmanshoop and Lüderitz .

history

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

Heinrich Schmelen

Bethanie owes its establishment and name to the London Mission Society (LMS), namely the missionary Heinrich Schmelen . He came across the Orange River in 1815 together with an Orlam company that had emigrated from Pella and found here “a permanent spring that cannot be closed with a stone” - called “ ǀUiǂgandes ” on Khoekhoegowab and “Klipfontein” in Afrikaans - and good grazing land.

Schmelen named the place from then on after the biblical place where Jesus Christ was baptized, Bethanien. Here he built the first stone house built by Europeans in South West Africa , which can still be visited today - the Schmelenhaus from 1815 - and tried to make the Orlam and the Nama ( Bethanien-Nama ) who followed him settle here and to convert to the Christian faith . The two-tower church was built in 1859.

On May 1, 1883, Bethanie once again gained historical significance when Heinrich Vogelsang concluded the first land acquisition contract for Adolf Lüderitz with the Orlam Kaptein Joseph Frederiks II and thus laid the foundation stone for the later German colony of German South West Africa .

Today Bethanie is a small, but important supply base for the farmers and Nama in the area, where everything is available that is needed for daily life.

Local politics

The following official final result was determined in the 2015 local elections .

Political party	be right	Share of votes	Seats
SWAPO	278	54.2%	2
DTA	188	36.6%	2
RDP	047	09.2%	1
All in all	513	100%	5

Remarks

1. ↑ Note: This article contains characters from the alphabet of the Khoisan languages spoken in southern Africa . The display contains characters of the click letters ǀ , ǁ , ǂ and ǃ . For more information on the pronunciation of long or nasal vowels or certain clicks , see e.g. B. under Khoekhoegowab .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bethanie on a map from the time of German South West Africa
2. ↑ Bethanie's teenage pregnancy rate worrisome . The Namibian, March 25, 2013.
3. ↑ Official election result of the regional and local elections 2015 ( Memento of the original from December 10, 2015 in the Internet Archive ; PDF; 150 kB) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ECN, December 4, 2015 

Coordinates: 26 ° 30 ′  S , 17 ° 10 ′  E