About Windhoek

he city of Windhoek is traditionally known by two names: Ai-Gams, from the Nama people, which literally refers to the hot springs that were once part of Windhoek, while the second name, Otjomuise, meaning a place of steam, was given by the Herero people. Both traditional names reference the hot springs. The early settlements of Windhoek came about because of the water from the hot springs. In the mid-1800s Captain Jan Jonker Afrikaner settled near one of the main hot springs, located in the present-day Klein-Windhoek, an upper-class suburb of Windhoek. Theories vary on how Ai-Gams/Otjomuise got its modern name of Windhoek. Most believe the name Windhoek is derived from the Afrikaans word Wind-Hoek, meaning "corner of wind." It is also thought that the Afrikaner named Windhoek after the Windhoek Mountains, at Tulbagh in South Africa, where the early Afrikaner settlers had lived. In those days Windhoek was the point of contact between the warring Namas, led by Jan Jonker Afrikaner, and the Herero. In Windhoek, Afrikaners built a stone church that held 500 people, which was also used as a school. Two Rhenish missionaries, Hugo Hahn and Heinrich Kleinschmidt, started working there in the 1840s and were later succeeded by two Wesleyans. Gardens were laid out and for a while Windhoek prospered, but wars between the Nama and Herero eventually destroyed the town. After a long absence, Hahn visited Windhoek again in 1873 and was dismayed to see that nothing remained of the town's former prosperity. In June 1885, a Swiss botanist found only jackals and starving guinea fowl amongst neglected fruit trees.