° Oranjestad ° Philipsburg ° Rotterdam ° Scheveningen ° St. Martin ° Tilburg ° Vlissingen ° Willemstad
The history of Holland is mainly a history of water. One thousand years ago there was nothing there but inaccessible marshes. The nobility urgently wanted farmers to develop the empty land, and was willing to pay a high price for it. Unlike the rest of Europe, farmers got property rights. Of course they had to pay taxes, 10 percent of the harvest, but they were independent. The roots of democracy in Holland are in the fight against water.
In the 12th century, the "waterschappen" were formed for general control on all matters concerning water.
AMSTERDAM
A blooming economy helped Amsterdam to grow into the biggest city in the province of Holland, with some 30,000 inhabitants.
The IJ waterway (pronounced "eye") was still an estuary. In it was a port directly connected to Damrak. Ocean-going vessels could sail right into the city, which was covered
in small houses, with a medieval, gothic city hall. The New Church (as opposed to the Old Church built a century earlier in 1300) was also surrounded by clusters of houses.
And the city limits were defined by the Singel canal to the west, and the Kloveniersburgwal (wall) to the east.
Merchant adventurers from Amsterdam sailed the seas to the far-off Indies or 'spice-islands' (today's Indonesia). Big risks brought bigger rewards. Soon, a process had been launched that would boom into the 'Golden Century'.
Towards the end of the 15th century, the great maritime powers of Portugal and Spain undertook epic voyages of discovery to the Americas and the Indies. Holland soon became involved in trading exotic imports from these regions, initially by collecting cargoes in Lisbon for sale and distribution to wider markets.
The situation changed in 1580 when Spain annexed Portugal. The northern Netherlanders now had to make the trip to the Indies under their own flag. Meanwhile many rich merchants from the southern Netherlands had moved to Amsterdam after Antwerp fell to the Spanish. Their arrival gave the city's business community an extra boost. Among the new arrivals were Portuguese Jews; having fled their home country for Antwerp, they were refugeesonce again.
Amsterdam's magnificent network of canals was set out in the 17th century. And along the canals which girdle the city, the citizens built houses taller than any seen in any other Dutch city centre.
ROTTERDAM
The city of Rotterdam has been officially in existence since 1328, when count Willem III granted "city rights" for the town that had been growing around a dam in the river Rotte. (Hence the name: Rotte-dam.) Almost three decades before that, Wolfert van Borselen, a nobleman who acted as a governor for count Jan I of Holland, had already awarded porters rights and freedom of toll to the porters of Rotterdam.
Initially Rotterdam was just a small, quiet fishing harbor in a bend in the Rotte. It slowly grew, but on the whole it remained a town of very little significance, especially when compared to its main competitors Delft and Dordrecht, which were much more important in trade and industry in those days. But Dordrecht suffered severe damage from the St. Elisabeth flood of 1421, while Delft failed to excavate the larger harbor it needed to support the trade, mostly as a result of internal political machinations. Rotterdam had no such problems: its position near to deep water was much better than that of its competitors, and it had a readily accessible harbor. Trade flourished, and many goods started to pass through Rotterdam on their way to and from the ships that frequented her harbor.
In the 1570s, during the war with Spain, Rotterdam managed to fortify its position as a port of trade, when it became one of the few ports open to the sea. Antwerp and Amsterdam were being blocked because of the war. Explosive growth followed. The city expanded, the walls around it were torn down as soon as the dangers of war diminished, and new harbors were excavated, especially during the 17th century.
Only in the 19th century, when the port facilities were enlarged again, it started to boom once more. Rotterdam embraced the industrial revolution of the 19th century. Steam power and mechanization boosted the capacity of the port enormously, while railroads took care of transport of the goods over land. An elevated railroad using the latest techniques for steel construction was built, and steam-powered harbor cranes speeded up the loading and unloading of ships tremendously. Means of transport and an infrastructure to handle the flow of goods from one place to another became increasingly vital. Steel bridges were built to connect both sides of the River Maas. The Nieuwe Waterweg ('New Waterway') was completed in 1872, which gave Rotterdam a direct, high-capacity connection to the North Sea. As often happens during periods of rapid expansion, older buildings were often sacrificed to make way for new ones. This process continued well into the 20th century.
