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Gondar, also spelled Gonder (Amharic: ጎንደር, Gonder or Gondär; formerly ጐንደር, Gwandar or Gwender), is a city and woreda in Ethiopia. Located in the North Gondar Zone of the Amhara Region, Gondar is north of Lake Tana on the Lesser Angereb River and southwest of the Simien Mountains. , Gondar has an estimated population of 443,156. Gondar previously served as the capital of both the Ethiopian Empire and the subsequent Begemder Province. The city holds the remains of several royal castles, including those in the Fasil Ghebbi UNESCO World Heritage Site for which Gondar has been called the "Camelot of Africa". History of Gondar Until the 16th century, the Solomonic Emperors of Ethiopia usually had no fixed capital town, but instead lived in tents in temporary royal camps as they moved around their realms while their family, bodyguard and retinue devoured surplus crops and cut down nearby trees for firewood. One exception to this rule was Debre Berhan, founded by Zara Yaqob in 1456; Tegulet in Shewa was also essentially the capital during the first century of Solomonic rule. Gondar was founded by Emperor Fasilides around the year 1635, and grew as an agricultural and market town. There was a superstition at the time that the capital's name should begin with the letter 'Gwa' (modern pronunciation 'Gwe'; Gonder was originally spelt Gwandar), which also contributed to Gorgora's (founded as Gwargwara) growth in the centuries after 1600. Tradition also states that a buffalo led the Emperor Fasilides to a pool beside the Angereb, where an "old and venerable hermit" told the Emperor he would locate his capital there. Fasilides had the pool filled in and built his castle on that same site. The emperor also built a total of seven churches; the first two, Fit Mikael and Qedus Abbo, were built to end local epidemics. The five emperors who followed him also built their palaces in the town. Beginning with Emperor Menas in 1559, the rulers of Ethiopia began spending the rainy season near Lake Tana, often returning to the same location each year.

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Related concepts (16)

Amhara Region

Agaw people

The Agaw or Agew (አገው Agäw, modern Agew) are a pan-ethnic identity native to the northern highlands of Ethiopia and neighboring Eritrea. They speak the Agaw languages, which belong to the Cushitic branch of the Afroasiatic language family, and are therefore linguistically closely related to peoples speaking other Cushitic languages. The Agaw peoples in general were historically noted by travelers and outside observers to have practiced what some described as a “Hebraic religion”, though some practiced Ethiopian Orthodoxy, and many were Beta Israel Jews.

Ethiopian Highlands

The Ethiopian Highlands (also called the Abyssinian Highlands) is a rugged mass of mountains in Ethiopia in Northeast Africa. It forms the largest continuous area of its elevation in the continent, with little of its surface falling below , while the summits reach heights of up to . It is sometimes called the Roof of Africa due to its height and large area. Most of the Ethiopian Highlands are part of central and northern Ethiopia, and its northernmost portion reaches into Eritrea.