Information about Holland

Holland is a region in the central-western part of the Netherlands with a population of 6.1 million people. Holland was a county of the Holy Roman Empire, ruled by the Count of Holland, and later became the dominant province of the Republic of the Seven United Provinces (1581–1795).

Geography

The name Holland, first appearing in the sources in 866 for the region around Haarlem and used for the county from 1064, is derived from holtland ("wooded land"), a usual spelling variation until the 14th century. Popular, but incorrect, etymology holds that it is derived from hol land ("hollow land"), inspired by the low-lying geography of both the Dutch Holland and the English region (Holland, Lincolnshire). Apart from coastal dunes most of the surface consists of polder landscape, lying well below sea-level and only kept from flooding by continuous drainage, for which in earlier centuries the typical Dutch windmills were used. In recent millennia the geography of the region has been extremely dynamic with the western coastline shifting up to thirty kilometres to the east, the Frisian Isles becoming detached from the north of Holland and the main Rhine and Maas rivers changing their course repeatedly and dramatically. In the last thousand years this process has been complicated by human activities. Behind the row of coastal dunes a large and high peat plateau had grown, protecting the land against the sea. In the tenth century this area was brought under cultivation; the drainage had extreme soil shrinkage as result, lowering the surface up to fifteen metres. In Zealand and Frisia this led to catastrophic storm floods literally washing away entire regions and the sea hollowed Holland out from behind, forming the Zuiderzee. Only drastic administrative intervention saved the county from utter destruction. The Counts and large monasteries took the lead in this, building the first really heavy emergency dykes to bolster critical points. Later special administrative bodies were formed, the waterschappen ("waterscapes"), with the power to enforce on penalty of death any decision they made regarding water management. They constructed an extensive dyke system with complete coverage of all polders, protecting the land from further incursions by the sea. From the 16th century onward, the Hollanders took the offensive and began land reclamation programmes, making polders of many lakes. As a result of all this historical maps bear little resemblance to the present situation.

The area is today divided between two provinces of the Netherlands: North Holland (Noord-Holland) and South Holland (Zuid-Holland) that were created in 1840, and make up roughly 13% of the area of the Netherlands. A few regions that were historically Hollandic became part of other provinces as a result of reforms during the French occupation (1795-1813). Willemstad and surroundings, the Biesbosch and the Land van Altena became eventually part of North Brabant in 1818. In 1942, after the Battle of the Netherlands the Germans ordered the islands of Vlieland and Terschelling to go to Friesland. This was not changed back after World War II. In 1950, the island of Urk went to Overijssel (in 1986 to Flevoland). More recent territorial changes are the transfer of Oudewater, Woerden and Vianen from South Holland to the province of Utrecht, in 1970, 1989 and 2002 respectively.

History

County of Holland

Holland arose as a county of the Holy Roman Empire in the 9th century. The Counts of Holland were also counts of Hainaut, Flanders and Zealand for several periods in the 13th-15th century. In this time a part of Frisia, West Friesland, was conquered and as a result most provincial institutions would for centuries bear the epithet "of Holland and West Frisia", such as the States of Holland and West Frisia. Partly because of the cultural antithesis between the regions, Holland was divided along the IJ between a Southern Quarter (Zuiderkwartier) and a Northern Quarter (Noorderkwartier). In 1432 Holland became part of the Burgundian Netherlands and since 1477 of the Habsburg Seventeen Provinces. In the 16th century the region became densely urbanised, with the majority of the population living in cities. Within the Burgundian Netherlands, it was the dominant province in the north; the political influence of Holland largely determined the extent of Burgundian dominion in that area.

In the Dutch Rebellion against the Habsburgs during the Eighty Years' War, the naval forces of the rebels, the Watergeuzen, established their first permanent base in 1572 in the Hollandic city of Brill. This way Holland, now a souvereign state as part of a larger Dutch confederation, became the center of the rebellion and as a result the cultural, political and economic center of the United Provinces, in the 17th century, the Dutch Golden Age, the wealthiest nation in the world. The largest cities of the Dutch Republic were located within the province of Holland such as Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Leiden, Alkmaar, The Hague, Delft and Haarlem. From the great ports of Holland, Hollandic merchants sailed to and from destinations all over Europe, and merchants from all over Europe gathered to trade in the warehouses of Amsterdam and other trading cities of Holland. Many Europeans heard of the United Provinces first as "Holland" rather than "Republic of the Seven United Provinces of the Netherlands". This usage continues to this day. Externally a strong image of Holland was created, which image was then projected on the Republic as a whole; internally a slow process of Hollandic cultural expansion took place, leading to a more uniform culture for the whole of the Republic, that adopted the urban dialects of Holland as its standard language.

In this period the province became predominantly Calvinist but with a large Catholic minority.

After 1795

The formation of the Batavian Republic, inspired by the French revolution, led to a more centralised government; Holland from a sovereign state became a province of a unitary state. The independence of Holland was further reduced by an administrative reform in 1798, in which its territory was divided over several departments: Amstel, Delf, Texel, and (part of) Schelde en Maas.

From 1806-1810 Napoleon styled his vassal state, governed by his brother Louis Napoleon, which included much of the modern Netherlands, as the Kingdom of Holland. The name reflects how natural at the time it had become to equal Holland with the Northern Netherlands as a whole^[1].

After annexation by the French Empire (1810-1813), Holland was divided over the départements Zuyderzée and Bouches-de-la-Meuse. After 1813, Holland was restored as a province of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. It was divided into the present provinces North Holland and South Holland in 1840, after the Belgian Revolution of 1830.

From 1850 a strong process of nation formation took place, the Netherlands being culturally unified and economically integrated by a modernisation process with the Hollandic cities as its centre^[2]. This has led to a reaction by the peripheral regions, who saw their identity threatened: regionalism trying to maintain the local culture against Hollandic expansion. The other provinces thus have a strong, and often negative^[3], image of the Hollander, to whom certain qualities are ascribed within a mental geography^[4]; the Hollanders themselves however have a weak self-image^[5] as they take Hollandic cultural dominance for granted: to them the concepts of Holland and the Netherlands coincide and consequently they see themselves as simply Dutch^[6], a phenomenon known as hollandocentrism^[7]. The image of Holland — an artificial amalgam of tulips, windmills, clogs, Edam cheese and the traditional costume of Volendam fishermen — is actively exploited for Holland Promotion abroad.

Today, together with Utrecht, the main Hollandic cities: Amsterdam (the capital of the Netherlands), Rotterdam (Europe's largest harbour) and The Hague (the seat of government) form what is called Randstad Holland, one of the most densely populated regions of Europe. Effective state intervention in urban development has however limited the growth into an enormous urban sprawl: most of the province is still surprisingly rural, though featuring highly intensive agriculture, such as the famous tulip fields and many greenhouse areas. This implies that the population density in the cities themselves is even higher. A small minority of the Hollandic population still speaks the original Hollandic dialects.

References