NETHERLANDS 



4128 



NETHERLANDS 



History of the Netherlands 



The story of the present kingdom of the 

 Netherlands is bound up with that of Belgium, 

 for during part of their history these two have 

 been united and until 1830 the term Netherlands 

 included both countries. The word Holland, 

 on the other hand, formerly referred, not to the 

 nation, but only to the two provinces in it 

 which were once the County of Holland. 



In Roman times the Netherlands were the 

 home of three tribes, the Belgae (of whom 

 Caesar tells us), the Batavi and the Frisii, 

 whose names survive in Belgium, in Batavia, 

 the metropolis of Java, and in Friesland, one of 

 the Zuider Zee provinces. Before Charle- 

 magne's day most of the tribes had been Chris- 

 tianized, and all formed a part of his empire. 

 In the division which followed, the land east 

 of the Scheldt fell to the middle kingdom, 

 afterwards being alternately under East and 

 West Prankish dominion. Thus it came about 

 that there were three languages in the Nether- 

 lands: Walloon French, Dutch, and Flemish, 

 which resembled both. 



Under the feudal rule the quarrels between 

 the numerous petty rulers in the Netherlands 

 made it possible for a number of the towns to 

 obtain practical independence. The men of 

 the south were weavers, but those of the north 

 were fishermen, mariners and traders. In the 

 fifteenth century several towns jointly fitted up 

 a fleet, which attacked the Hanseatic League 

 and gained freedom for their commerce. Dutch 

 vessels grew in number and the Dutch mer- 

 chants became the wealthiest of the world. 

 Their city fleets fought even the king of France. 

 Protestantism had a firm hold a century be- 

 fore Luther, and with the advent of the print- 

 ing press the Low Countries became a center 

 of liberalism. Thus the Netherlands enjoyed 

 prosperity and comparative independence while 

 the rest of Europe knew little but war, oppres- 

 sion and turmoil, and it was natural that they 

 should become the scene of a mighty struggle 

 for liberty. 



In 1477 the Netherlanders forced Mary of 

 Burgundy to sign "The Great Privilege," the 

 Dutch Magna Charta, which left to the sov- 

 ereign even less power than the queen has 

 to-day. Charles V, ruler of nearly all Europe, 

 was born in the Netherlands and felt an in- 

 terest in its people, but his heavy taxes caused 

 revolts in Bruges and Ghent. His son Philip 

 II, a thoroughgoing Spaniard, did his best to 

 stamp out Protestantism with the Inquisition, 



but under the leadership of the great William 

 the Silent the Netherlanders drove out the 

 Spanish garrisons. 



Though Spain was at this time ruler of over 

 half the world, and the Netherlands was but a 

 tiny corner of it, the conflict between them 

 which lasted, with slight intervals, from 1567 

 to 1648 resulted in Spain's financial ruin and 

 Dutch rise to international poweV. Hitherto 

 the Dutch had been excluded from the Spanish 

 Indies; now they grew rich in its commerce. 

 France and England, enemies of Spain, gave 

 to the Dutch privileges of trade, and Amster- 

 dam became Europe's greatest commercial city, 

 with a population larger than it nad in the 

 middle of the nineteenth century. It was at 

 this period that the Dutch settled New York. 



But this very prosperity prevented the po- 

 litical advancement of the nation. The mer- 

 chants of the province of Holland opposed the 

 military activities of their stadtholders, or 

 state guardians, William the Silent and his suc- 

 cessors, because they did not want the rival 

 towns of Flanders, and Antwerp with its won- 

 derful harbor, included in the nation and shar- 

 ing their advantages. The Protestants, too, 

 persecuted their Roman Catholic brethren, who 

 predominated in the Belgian Netherlands. 

 Holland province even undertook to negotiate 

 treaties over the head of the States-General, 

 and it was due to Holland's aggression that in 

 1648 the United Netherlands signed a treaty 

 of peace with Spain, thus breaking its pledge 

 to its ally, France, and leaving the Belgian 

 Netherlands in Spanish hands. By this treaty 

 the independence of the United Netherlands 

 was recognized, and the River Scheldt was 

 closed to commerce, a step which caused the 

 ruin of Antwerp, Amsterdam's rival. 



The year 1650 is usually considered the turn- 

 ing point in Dutch history. Twenty years ear- 

 lier the office of stadtholder had been made 

 hereditary, but upon the sudden death of 

 William II, who in his two years' rule had thor- 

 oughly cowed the merchant politicians of Am- 

 sterdam, the governing power fell largely to 

 one Jan De Witt. In his time the Netherlands 

 fought two naval wars with England, provoked 

 largely by the latter's commercial jealousy. 

 The first, against Cromwell's Parliament, began 

 in 1652; the second, against Charles II, in 1665. 

 Though the Dutch carried nearly all the world's 

 trade in their merchant ships, their navy was 

 small, and success and failure alternated. 



