Gondar Province

Begemder (Amharic: በጌምድር) (also Gondar or Gonder after its 20th century capital) was a province in the northwestern part of Ethiopia.

There are several proposed etymologies for the name Begemder. One is that it came from Bega (Beja) plus meder (land) (meaning land of the Bega or Beja), as an inscription of Emperor Ezana of Aksum describes his movement of 4,400 conquered Beja to a not yet located province named Matlia.

A perhaps more plausible source for the name Bega is the self-name of the word Bega which means dry in the local language or another possible interpretation could be "sheep" where rearing of sheep which is called beg in Amharic in the. Thus, Begemder likely refers to 'land of that rear sheep or The land of Dry area".

Another etymology is that the first two syllables come from the Ge'ez language baggi` for sheep (Amharic: beg), although Beke claimed that sheep have never been pastured there, nor could they be raised there. Beckingham and Huntingford note that Begemder originally applied to the country east of Lake Tana, where water is scarce, and conclude, "The allusion to the lack of water suggests Amharic baga, "dry season", as a possible source of the name."

The earliest recorded mention of Begemder was on the Fra Mauro map, (c.1460), where it is described as a kingdom. While Emperor Lebna Dengel, in his letter to the King of Portugal (1526), also described Begemder as a kingdom, he included it as a subdivision of his empire. During the later 18th century, its capital was at Filakit Gereger, where Ras Ali died in 1788.

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