Everything about Netherlands Terminology totally explained
The
Netherlands is known under
various terms both in
English and other languages. These are used to describe the different overlapping geographical, linguistic and political areas of the Netherlands. This is often a source of confusion for people from other parts of the world. In English the country is called 'the Netherlands' (or frequently 'Holland'), while the people and the language are called 'Dutch'. Note that in
Dutch the official (and predominant) terms for these are 'Nederland' for the country, 'Nederlanders' for the people and 'Nederlands' for the language, although they're occasionally (colloquially) called 'Holland', 'Hollanders' and 'Hollands' respectively.
The Netherlands
"Netherlands" literally means "Low countries" or "Lowlands". Although the name of the country is singular in its native language (
Netherland, or "Low country"), the English language uses a plural form. This plural convention is actually archaic, referring to the period 1581 to 1795 when the
Dutch Republic was a loose confederation of seven provinces. The Dutch name for the Dutch Republic is
Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden (Republic of Seven United Low Countries) or
Nederlanden ("Low countries") for short.
The origin of the word
Netherlands is
Germanic. Between 1348 and 1566 the Netherlands formed part of the duchy of
Burgundy (as the
Burgundian Netherlands) and later the
Habsburg Empire (as the
Seventeen Provinces). The
Southern Provinces were known as
the Spanish Netherlands or later as
the Austrian Netherlands. From 1815-1830 the
United Kingdom of the Netherlands existed, but then
Belgium broke loose and 'Holland' kept the name of "the Netherlands".
Kingdom of the Netherlands
Outside the
Kingdom of the Netherlands, "Netherlands" may be used as the conventional short form to describe the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The latter encompasses the
Netherlands, a
constituent country within the Kingdom, the
Netherlands Antilles and
Aruba. In Dutch common practice, however, the Kingdom of the Netherlands is shortened to "Kingdom" and not to "Netherlands", as that may confuse the Kingdom with the constituent country. The
Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands also shortens the Kingdom of the Netherlands to Kingdom rather than "Netherlands".
Historically
Suriname and
Indonesia were also part of Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Netherlandish
The adjective "
Netherlandish" denotes both a period and a place, the latter being the Low Countries. Most common is the use of this adjective when referring to paintings produced before about 1530–1570 anywhere in the Low Countries, which are referred to as
Early Netherlandish painting (in Dutch
Vlaamse primitieven,
Flemish primitives—also common in English before the mid 20th century).
From around the 16th century onwards, art or artists from the southern
Catholic provinces are usually referred to as "
Flemish" and from the northern
Protestant provinces as
Dutch, but art historians sometimes refer to
Netherlandish art for art produced in both areas between 1400 and 1830.
Holland
In languages other than Dutch, including English, "Holland" is often used as a common synonym for the Netherlands as a whole. Strictly speaking, it refers only to the central-western part of the country, which consists of two of the country's twelve provinces:
North Holland and
South Holland. Such use of a part to designate its whole, which also occurs elsewhere, is called
pars pro toto, from
Latin. Examples include
Russia for the (former)
Soviet Union or the
Russian federation, and
England for the
United Kingdom (see also
British Isles terminology).
Historically Holland was the most powerful province of the Netherlands: the
counts of Holland were also counts of
Hainaut,
Friesland and
Zeeland between the 1200s and 1400s. During the period of the
Dutch Republic the
stadtholder of Holland was the most powerful politician in the Netherlands, who often also was stadtholder in other provinces; the cities in Holland were important trading cities, for instance of the six cities that made up the
Dutch East India Company, five were in Holland. The two provinces making up Holland still remain demographically dominant - they house 37% of the
Dutch population. The full name of the republican province was Holland and
West Friesland, so it can be argued that "Holland" doesn't even indicate the whole area of the two provinces. After the demise of the Dutch Republic under Napoleon, the country became the
Kingdom of Holland (1806-1810).
The name "Holland" for the Netherlands is also used colloquially by the Dutch themselves, especially in relation to
football, where the national team is sometimes cheered on with "Holland!" The term is also used for promotional purposes, because the name "Holland" is the best known worldwide.
In some provinces, especially
Friesland,
Groningen and
Limburg, the word
Hollander is frequently used in a pejorative sense, to refer to the supposedly arrogant inhabitants of
Randstad Holland. People from these provinces usually don't always appreciate being called
Hollander. In
Flanders as well, the word
Hollander is used in this pejorative sense.
The name "Holland" ultimately stems from its
Saxon name
Holtland ("woodlands" or "wooded lands").
Dutch
"Dutch" is the term used to describe the
inhabitants of the Netherlands,
their language, and as an adjective meaning "coming from or belonging to the Netherlands". Dutch isn't only spoken in the Netherlands, but also in Belgium by the
Flemish Community (in the
Flemish Region and the
Brussels-Capital Region), parts of northern France (around
Dunkirk), Suriname,
Aruba and the
Netherlands Antilles. Its southern dialects are sometimes called
Flemish.
Afrikaans, spoken in
South Africa and the southern part of
Namibia is derived from the Dutch language.
The English word "Dutch" is a
cognate to the Dutch word
dietsch and the German word
Deutsch. All these words have the same etymological origin. Both these terms derive from what in
Common West Germanic was known as
theodisca, which meant "(language) of the (common) people". During the early
Middle Ages, the elite mostly used
Latin and the common people used their local languages.
In the 1930s,
Nazi Germany sought to "re-unite" the Dutch language area by referring to it as
Dietsland.
In the United States, the term "Dutch" has in the past sometimes been used instead of
Deutsch to indicate a
German origin - for example
Dutch Schultz, the
Pennsylvania Dutch, and so forth.
Low Countries
The name "
Low Countries" may be used to refer to the Netherlands, while it actually refers to the historical region
de Nederlanden: those principalities located on and around the mostly low-lying land around the
delta of the
Rhine,
Scheldt, and
Meuse rivers. This area very roughly corresponds to the countries of the Netherlands,
Belgium and
Luxembourg. This region was called
Greater Netherlands by
irredentists who sought to unite it. This historical region also was referred to as "The Netherlands" in English. Between 1579 and 1794 the area comprising present Belgium, Luxembourg and parts of northern France was called the
Southern Netherlands (or the "Spanish Netherlands" between 1579 and 1713, the "Austrian Netherlands" after 1713, after the main possession of their Habsburg lord).
This region was united three times, in the
Seventeen Provinces as a
personal union during the 16th century, in the
United Kingdom of the Netherlands between 1815 and 1830 under King
William I, and as the
BeNeLux customs union founded in 1948.
Other languages
In most languages, the name for the country literally means "Low Countries" or is derived from
Nederland or
Holland.
- The name "Holland", or derivations of it, is commonly used for the Netherlands in many languages. Sometimes it's even the official name of the country, for example, Hollanda (هولاندا) (Arabic language), Holland (הולנד) (Hebrew), Hélán (荷兰) (Chinese), and Oranda (オランダ) (Japanese), Holandia (Polish), Holandsko (Slovak), Olanda (Romanian) or Belanda (Indonesian), Hollanda (Turkish), Ollandia (Ολλανδία) (Greek), Hoà Lan (Vietnamese), Hollandia (Hungarian). This failure to distinguish between Holland and the Netherlands can lead to confusion, in these languages, when contrasting the two provinces of Holland with the rest of the country.
- Other countries use a literal translation of "the Netherlands". This often becomes indistinguishable from "the Low Countries", for example, les Pays-Bas (French), Los Países Bajos (Spanish), I Paesi Bassi (Italian), Os Países Baixos (Portuguese), Nizozemska (Slovenian), Yr Iseldiroedd (Welsh), An Ísiltír (Irish), Els Països Baixos (Catalan).
- In Finnish, German, Czech, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese, both names are used. In Finnish the country is called either Hollanti or Alankomaat, which is a translation of "the Netherlands". In German, the country is called either die Niederlande or Holland, while in the Czech Republic, the country is called either Nizozemsko which is a translation of "the Netherlands" or, unofficially, Holandsko.
- In Bengali, the name of the country is taken from the English word "Netherlands" (নেদারল্যান্ডস Nedarlênḍs), while the name of the language is taken from the French word "Hollandaise" (ওলন্দাজ Olondaj).
Netherlands-related naming issues
Abel Tasman gave the name
New Holland to the continent now known as
Australia, a name it retained for 150 years until the
United Kingdom renamed it in 1824.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Netherlands Terminology'.
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