Behm  Ernst

(04.01.1830 - 15.03.1884)

German geographer and statistics.

Born in Gotha.

Behm studied medicine and natural sciences at the universities of Jena, Berlin and Würzburg. In 1856 he began working in the journal Geographical Communications in Gotha, a geographic journal in German, founded by Augustus Heinrich Peterman.

In 1866, he became the editor of Geographische Jahrbuch (Geographical Chronicles), and from 1872, with Hermann Wagner, he edited the geographical / statistical survey “Population of the Earth”. Beginning in 1876, he headed the editorial office of the statistical department of Gotishen Hofkalenders, and in 1878, after the death of Petermann, he became the editor of the journal "Geographical Communications".

In 1872, Behm published an article entitled Beweise für die Identität des Lualaba mit dem Congo (Evidence of Lualab’s Congo Connection with Congo), which scientifically demonstrated that Lualaba was the headwater of the Congo River. This statement was later confirmed by Henry Morton Stanley in 1877.

A small island in the Strait of Khinlopen, Spitsbergen. Coordinates 79° 20'N    20° 30'E.