Otjikoto Lake is the smaller of only two natural lakes in Namibia

Namibia

Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia , is a country in southern Africa whose western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and east. It gained independence from South Africa on 21 March...

. It is a sinkhole lake, created by a collapsing karst

Karst topography

Karst topography is a geologic formation shaped by the dissolution of a layer or layers of soluble bedrock, usually carbonate rock such as limestone or dolomite, but has also been documented for weathering resistant rocks like quartzite given the right conditions.Due to subterranean drainage, there...

 cave, located 20 km outside of Tsumeb

Tsumeb

Tsumeb is a city of 15,000 inhabitants and the largest town in Oshikoto region in northern Namibia. Tsumeb is the home of the world-famous Tsumeb mine, and the "gateway to the north" of Namibia. It is the closest town to the Etosha National Park...

, a few meters from the main road B1

B1 road (Namibia)

The B1 is one of the most important roads in Namibia, passing through the centre of the country in a north-south direction. It connects Noordoewer on the South African border with Oshikango in the north on the Angolan border...

.

The lake was known to the San

Bushmen

The indigenous people of Southern Africa, whose territory spans most areas of South Africa, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Mozambique, Swaziland, Botswana, Namibia, and Angola, are variously referred to as Bushmen, San, Sho, Barwa, Kung, or Khwe...

 under the name Gaisis ("ugly"). When the Herero moved into the area, they named it Otjikoto (Otjiherero

Herero language

The Herero language is a language of the Bantu family . It is spoken by the Herero people in Namibia and Botswana...

: "deep hole"). The first Europeans to discover the lake were Francis Galton

Francis Galton

Sir Francis Galton /ˈfrɑːnsɪs ˈgɔːltn̩/ FRS , cousin of Douglas Strutt Galton, half-cousin of Charles Darwin, was an English Victorian polymath: anthropologist, eugenicist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist, psychometrician, and statistician...

 and Carl Johan Andersson

Charles John Andersson

- References :* at Internet Archive...

, who during their search for Lake Ngami

Lake Ngami

Lake Ngami is an endorheic lake in Botswana north of the Kalahari Desert. It is seasonally filled by the Taughe River an affluent of the Okavango River system flowing out of the western side of the Okavango Delta. It is one of the fragmented remnants of the ancient Lake Makgadikgadi...

 came upon Otjikoto Lake in 1851.

The lake was a dumping ground for German

German Empire

The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...

 Schutztruppe

Schutztruppe

Schutztruppe was the African colonial armed force of Imperial Germany from the late 19th century to 1918, when Germany lost its colonies. Similar to other colonial forces, the Schutztruppe consisted of volunteer European commissioned and non-commissioned officers, medical and veterinary officers. ...

at the end of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

; In June 1915 German troops dumped war materials in the lake before surrendering to stop the South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

n and British

British Empire

The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...

 troops from using them. Most of the larger pieces have been recovered and are displayed in Tsumeb Museum. The ammunition is still in the lake and can be viewed with a special diving permit. According to legend, the Germans also dumped a sealed safe into the lake. The search for it and the 6 million Mark

German gold mark

The Goldmark was the currency used in the German Empire from 1873 to 1914.-History:Before unification, the different German states issued a variety of different currencies, though most were linked to the Vereinsthaler, a silver coin containing 16⅔ grams of pure silver...

 it is said to contain has as yet not been successful.

Tilapia guinasana, a mouth-breeding species of fish which naturally was only found in Otjikoto's sister lake, Lake Guinas

Lake Guinas

Lake Guinas is the larger of only two natural lakes in Namibia. It is a sinkhole lake, created by a collapsing karst cave located 32 km north of Tsumeb near the D3043 road....

, was introduced to Otjikoto Lake. The claim that lake Guinas is indeed connected to lake Otjikoto by underground caves is frequently made but not proven as yet.