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History and stories accompany the community to the present day, also those that seem long forgotten. Part of those is for sure the 'turtle swamp', which gave the village once its name. In the opinion of linguistic researcher it resulted from the Elb-Slavic syllables 'elvi' and 'lag', which means translated turtle and swampy ground. In later time it became 'suluelanc' (1335), 'Selvelank' (1541). This statement is supported by the ample existence of terrapins at the Selbelanger area until the 19th century. Part of the village's past is the often changing reign and the with that connected sectioning of the area.Today the villages Kamerun, Bienenfarm and Lindholzfarm are part of the community.
From 1928 to 1945 Selbelang was part of the neighbouring village Retzow.
When one hears Bienenfarm (bee farm), one could assume that this village was founded by bee lovers. but alas this is not true. Today, large 'bees' are flying here because Bienenfarm is situated near an airfield. The village Kamerun has also nothing to do with the former German colony and wasn't founded by the 'imperial protection force'. After the 2nd World War a former knight's manor was turned into a publicly owned estate. But actual money was made with the distillery, which delivered their products to the Berlin company 'Bärensiegel'. Maybe somebody remembers the headaches that some of the products caused in the morning after.
The pictures + contents of this page were kindly made available by Stadtmagazinverlag AS GmbH. Photo: Stadtmagazinverlag AS