Johannesburg
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Johannesburg is a city in South Africa, where it serves as the provincial capital of Gauteng. It is one of the largest cities in the world that is neither on the coast nor on a major river or waterway.
Johannesburg was founded after the discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand in the late 19th century. Although the city's own mines have long since been abandoned, it is still known in the Zulu language as eGoli, that is, the "place of gold".
Although it was a prosperous city throughout the 20th century, in the 1990s Johannesburg was affected by urban blight, as millions of poor, mostly black, people who had been kept out artificially by the policy of Apartheid, moved into the city from surrounding black townships such as Soweto. Many leading corporations and institutions, including the Johannesburg Securities Exchange, moved their headquarters to the northern suburb of Sandton. Reviving the city centre is one of the main aims of the municipal government of Johannesburg.
It is not known for certain who the "Johannes" (Afrikaans for "John" was after whom the city was named. Several candidates have been put forward over the years.
