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Kagera

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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a river of east equatorial Africa, the most remote headstream of the Nile. The sources of its principal upper branch, the Nyavarongo, rise in the hill country immediately east of Lake Kivu. After a course of over 400 m. the Kagera enters Victoria Nyanza on its western shore in o° 58' S. It is navigable by steamers for 70 m. from its mouth, being obstructed by rapids above that point. The river was first heard of by J. H. Speke in 1858, and was first seen (by white men) by the same traveller (Jan. 16, 1862) on his journey to discover the Nile source. Speke was well aware that the Kagera was the chief river emptying into the Victoria Nyanza and in that sense the headstream of the Nile. By him the stream was called "Kitangule," kagera being given as equivalent to "river." The exploration of the Kagera has been largely the work of German travellers.

See Nile; also Speke's Discovery of the Source of the Nile (Edinburgh, 1863); R. Kandt's Caput Nili (Berlin, 1904); and map by P. Sprigade and M. Moisel in Grosser deutscher Kolonialatlas, No.16 (Berlin, 1906).