Lake Victoria Lake Victoria Lake Victoria (' in Luo; ' in Uganda; "" in Kinyarwanda and some Bantu languages) is one of the African Great Lakes. The lake was named after Queen Victoria by the explorer John Hanning Speke, the first Briton to document it. Speke accomplished this in 1858, while on an expedition with Richard Francis Burton to locate the source of the Nile River. With a surface area of approximately , Lake Victoria is Africa's largest lake by area, the world's largest tropical lake, and the world's second largest fresh water lake by surface area after Lake Superior in North
John Hanning Speke Speke was much attached to Bombay and spoke highly of his honesty and conscientiousness. Bombay's efforts in dealing with hostile tribes, interpreting and keeping the safari crew on track was a great help to the expedition. Less is known of Mabruki, the other caravan leader, but he was later known as Mabruki Speke, and like Bombay became one of East Africa's great caravan leaders and was also a member of the Yao tribe like Bombay. Because of Speke's recommendations both Bombay and Mabruki served on Henry Stanley's 1871 expedition to find Livingstone. On 26 September 1859 the return journey from