The land is mostly made up ofgrassland and it has numerouslakes. The area of the province was once part of the ancient, larger region ofFrisia, which gave the province its name. Friesland today is the home of the Netherlands's ethnicFrisian people.[7] The official languages of Friesland areWest Frisian andDutch, and almost all West Frisian speakers arebilingual with Dutch.[8]
In 1996, theProvincial Council of Friesland resolved that the official name of the province should follow theWest Frisian spelling rather than the Dutch spelling, resulting in "Friesland" being replaced by "Fryslân".[10] In 2004, theDutch government confirmed this resolution, putting in place a three-year scheme to oversee the name change and associated cultural programme.[11]
The province of Friesland is occasionally referred to as "Frisia" by, amongst others, Hanno Brand, head of the history and literature department at theFryske Akademy since 2009.[12] However, the English-language webpage of the Friesland Provincial Council refers to the province as "Fryslân".[13]
TheFrisii were among the migrating Germanic tribes that, following the breakup of Celtic Europe in the 4th century BC, settled along the North Sea. They came to control the area from roughly present-dayBremen toBruges, and conquered many of the smaller offshore islands. What little is known of the Frisii is provided by a few Roman accounts, most of them military.Pliny the Elder said their lands were forest-covered with tall trees growing up to the edge of the lakes.[14] They lived by agriculture[15] and raising cattle.[16]
In hisGermania, Tacitus described all the Germanic peoples of the region as having elected kings with limited powers and influential military leaders who led by example rather than by authority. The people lived in spread-out settlements.[17] He specifically noted the weakness of Germanic political hierarchies in reference to the Frisii, when he mentioned the names of two kings of the 1st century Frisii and added that they were kings "as far as the Germans are under kings".[18]
In the 1st century BC, the Frisii halted a Roman advance and thus managed to maintain their independence.[19] Some or all of the Frisii may have joined into the Frankish and Saxon peoples in late Roman times, but they would retain a separate identity in Roman eyes until at least 296, when they were forcibly resettled aslaeti[20] (Roman-era serfs) and thereafter disappear from recorded history. Their tentative existence in the 4th century is confirmed by archaeological discovery of a type of earthenware unique to 4th-centuryFrisia, calledterp Tritzum, showing that an unknown number of Frisii were resettled inFlanders andKent,[21] likely aslaeti under the aforementioned Roman coercion. The lands of the Frisii were largely abandoned byc. 400 as a result of the conflicts of theMigration Period, climate deterioration, and the flooding caused by a rise in the sea level.
The Frisian realm in 716 AD. The Frisian Kingdom covered only the western part of the area.
The area lay empty for one or two centuries, when changing environmental and political conditions made the region habitable again. At that time, during the Migration Period, "new"Frisians (probably descended from a merging ofFrisii,Angles,Saxons andJutes) repopulated the coastal regions.[22][23]: 792 These Frisians consisted of tribes with loose bonds, centred on war bands but without great power. The earliest Frisian records name four social classes, the'ethelings (nobiles in Latin documents;adel in Dutch and German) andfrilings (vrijen in Dutch andFreien in German), who together made up the "Free Frisians" who might bring suit at court, and thelaten orliten with theslaves, who were absorbed into thelaten during theEarly Middle Ages, as slavery was not so much formally abolished, as evaporated.[a] Thelaten were tenants of lands they did not own and might be tied to it in the manner ofserfs, but in later times might buy their freedom.[24]: 202
Under the rule of KingAldgisl, the Frisians came in conflict with the Frankishmayor of the palaceEbroin, over the old Roman border fortifications. Aldgisl could keep the Franks at a distance with his army. During the reign ofRedbad, however, the tide turned in favour of the Franks; in 690, the Franks were victorious in theBattle of Dorestad.[25] In 733,Charles Martel sent an army against the Frisians. The Frisian army was pushed back toEastergoa. The next year theBattle of the Boarn took place. Charles ferried an army across theAlmere with a fleet that enabled him to sail up to De Boarn. The Frisians were defeated in the ensuing battle,[23]: 795 and their last kingPoppo was killed.[26] The victors began plundering and burning heathen sanctuaries. Charles Martel returned with much loot, and broke the power of the Frisian kings for good. The Franks annexed the Frisian lands between theVlie and theLauwers. They conquered the area east of the Lauwers in 785, whenCharlemagne defeatedWidukind. The Carolingians laid Frisia under the rule ofgrewan, a title that has been loosely related tocount in its early sense of "governor" rather than "feudal overlord".[24]: 205 About 100,000 Dutch drowned in a flood in 1228.[27]
Around 800, when theScandinavianVikings first attackedFrisia, which was still underCarolingian rule, the Frisians were released from military service on foreign territory in order to be able to defend themselves against the heathen Vikings. With their victory in theBattle of Norditi in 884 they were able to drive the Vikings permanently out ofEast Frisia, although it remained under constant threat. Over the centuries, whilstfeudal lords reigned in the rest of Europe, no aristocratic structures emerged in Frisia. This 'Frisian freedom' was represented abroad byredjeven who were elected from among the wealthier farmers or from elected representatives of the autonomous rural municipalities. Originally theredjeven were all judges, so-calledAsega, who were appointed by the territorial lords.[28]
After significant territories were lost toHolland in theFriso-Hollandic Wars, Frisia saw an economic downturn in the mid-14th century. Accompanied by a decline in monasteries and other communal institutions, social discord led to the emergence of untitled nobles calledhaadlingen ("headmen"), wealthy landowners possessing large tracts of land and fortified homes[29] who took over the role of the judiciary as well as offering protection to their local inhabitants. Internal struggles between regional leaders resulted in bloody conflicts and the alignment of regions along two opposing parties: theFetkeapers and Skieringers. On 21 March 1498,[30] a small group of Skieringers from Westergo secretly met withAlbert III, Duke of Saxony, theGovernor of the Habsburg Netherlands, inMedemblik requesting his help.[31] Albrecht, who had gained a reputation as a formidable military commander, accepted and soon conquered all Friesland.Emperor Maximilian of Habsburg appointed Albrecht hereditary potestate and gubernator of Friesland in 1499.[32]
In 1515, an army of haadlingen and peasants, with the help of mercenaries known as theArumer Zwarte Hoop, started a fight for freedom from oppression by the Habsburg authorities.[33] One of the leaders wasPier Gerlofs Donia, whose farm had been burned down and whose kinfolk had been killed by a maraudingLandsknecht regiment. Since the regiment had been employed by theHabsburg authorities to suppress the civil war of theFetkeapers and Skieringers, Donia put the blame on the authorities. After this he gathered angry peasants and some petty noblemen from Frisia and Gelderland and formed theArumer Zwarte Hoop.The rebels received financial support fromCharles II, Duke of Guelders, who claimed the Duchy ofGuelders in opposition to the House of Habsburg. Charles also employed mercenaries under command of his military commanderMaarten van Rossum in their support. However, when the tides turned against the rebels after the Donia's death in 1520, Charles withdrew his support, without which the rebels could no longer afford to pay their mercenary army.[34] The revolt was put to an end in 1523 and Frisia was incorporated into theHabsburg Netherlands, bringing an end to the Frisian freedom.[33]
The Frisian representative refusing to kneel beforePhilip II at his coronation
Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, became the first lord of theLordship of Frisia. He appointedGeorg Schenck van Toutenburg, who had crushed the peasants' revolt, asStadtholder to rule over the province in his stead. When Charles abdicated in 1556, Frisia was inherited byPhilip II of Spain along with the rest of the Netherlands. In 1566, Frisia joined theDutch Revolt against Spanish rule.
In 1577,George de Lalaing, Count of Rennenberg was appointed Stadtholder of Frisia and other provinces. A moderate, trusted by both sides, he tried to reconcile the rebels with the Crown. But in 1580, Rennenburg declared for Spain. TheStates of Frisia raised troops and took his strongholds of Leeuwarden, Harlingen and Stavoren. Rennenburg was deposed and Frisia became the fifth Lordship to join the rebels'Union of Utrecht. From 1580 onward, all stadtholders were members of theHouse of Orange-Nassau. With thePeace of Münster in 1648, Frisia became a full member of the independentDutch Republic, a federation of provincies. In economic and therefore also political importance, Friesland was next in rank to the provinces ofHolland andZeeland.
In 1798, three years after theBatavian Revolution, the provincial lordship of Frisia was abolished and its territory was divided between the Eems and Oude IJssel departments. This was short-lived, however, as Frisia was revived as a department in 1802. When the Netherlands were annexed by theFirst French Empire in 1810, the department was in French renamedFrise. AfterNapoleon was defeated in 1813 and a new constitution was introduced in 1814, Friesland became a province of theSovereign Principality of the United Netherlands, then of the unitaryKingdom of the Netherlands a year later.
Most of Friesland is on the mainland, but it also includes a number ofWest Frisian Islands, includingVlieland,Terschelling,Ameland andSchiermonnikoog, which are connected to the mainland by ferry. The province's highest point is a dune at 45 metres (148 ft) above sea level, on the island of Vlieland.
Since the late Middle Ages, Friesland has been renowned for the exceptional height of its inhabitants.[43] Even early Renaissance poetDante Alighieri refers to the height ofFrisians in hisDivine Comedy when, in the canticle aboutHell, he talks about the magnitude of an infernal demon by stating that "not even three tall Frieslanders, were they set one upon the other, would have matched his height".[44]
In 2015, 28.5% of the population belonged to theProtestant Church in the Netherlands, while 6.6% wereRoman Catholic, 1.1% wereMuslim and 6.5% belonged to other churches or faiths. Over half of the population (57.2%) identified as non-religious, above the national average.
Religiosity and Christian denominations by municipality (2015)[46](% per local population)
Friesland is mainly an agricultural province. The black and whiteFrisian cattle, black and whiteStabyhoun and the blackFrisian horse originated here.Tourism is another important source of income: the principal tourist destinations include the lakes in the southwest of the province and the islands in theWadden Sea to the north. There are195 windmills in the province of Friesland, out of a total of about 1200 in the entire country.
TheGross domestic product (GDP) of the region was 19.8 billion € in 2018, accounting for 2.6% of the Netherlands economic output. GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power was €26,700 or 89% of the EU27 average in the same year.[47]
A West Frisian speaker, recorded in theNetherlands.
Friesland is one of the twelve provinces of the Netherlands to have its national language that is recognized as such,West Frisian. Before the 18th century, varieties of Frisian were also spoken in the provinces ofNorth Holland andGroningen, and together with the Frisian speakers inEast Friesland andNorth Friesland a continuous linguistic area existed between Amsterdam and the present day Danish-German border.
Themutual intelligibility in reading between Dutch and Frisian is limited. Acloze test in 2005 revealed native Dutch speakers understood 31.9% of a West Frisian newspaper, 66.4% of anAfrikaans newspaper and 97.1% of a Dutch newspaper.[48] In 2007,West Frisian is the native language of 54.3% of the inhabitants of the province of Friesland, followed byDutch with 34.7%, and speakers of other regional languages, most of these restricted to Friesland, with 9.7%, and in the end other foreign languages with 1.4%. Frisian speakers are traditionally underrepresented in urban areas, and predominant in the countryside.[49]
West Frisian is also spoken in a small adjacent part of the province ofGroningen. Up to the 18th century Frisian was spoken in the, at that time Prussian and Hanoverian, lordships ofEast Friesland). Since then the East Frisian population switched toEast Frisian (Ostfriesisch), aLow German dialect. Only in some, formerly remoted, East Frisian villages (Saterland) a variety of historicallyEast Frisian (Seeltersk) is still in use but by an older generation. A collection of dialects namedNorth Frisian, is or was spoken inNorth Friesland, alongside the North Sea coast and on the islands ofSchleswig-Holstein. The named Frisian languages are historically related toOld English, which points towards the fact thatAngles andSaxons, eventually accompanied by Frisians, came from these areas.
In the former municipality ofhet Bildt the Hollandic dialect ofBildts is spoken. It contains a lot of Frisian influence. In most of the cities of Leeuwarden,Town Frisian is spoken. As with Bildts, these variants are Hollandic dialects with Frisian influence.
The language policy in Friesland is preservation. West Frisian is a mandatory subject in Friesland in primary and secondary schools of the Frisian speaking districts. Bilingual (Dutch–Frisian) and trilingual (Dutch–English–Frisian) schools in the province of Friesland use West Frisian as a language of instruction in some lessons, besides Dutch in most other lessons and alongside them English. Literacy in Frisian however, is not often a core aim and that makes the number of Frisians speakers able to write in Frisian only 12%.[51]
The provincial government takes various initiatives to preserve the West Frisian language. All parents in Friesland receive, at their children's birth, information about language and multilingualism (e.g. 'taaltaske'[clarification needed]). To support the use of Frisian in public and at public events, the province also invests in the development of speech pathology materials and strives to create information technology devices for the West Frisian language. The Frisian government subsidizes theAfûk organization, which offers language courses and actively promotes Frisian in all sectors of society as well as the corporate domain which as a rule is dominated by Dutch and English.[52] The province also promotes a wide range of art and entertainment in Frisian.[53]
The province is famous for itsspeed skaters, with mass participation in cross-country ice skating when weather conditions permit. When winters are cold enough to allow the freshwater canals to freeze hard, the province holds its traditionalElfstedentocht (Eleven cities tour), a 200-kilometre (120 mi)ice skating tour. A traditional sport isFrisian handball. Another Frisian practice isfierljeppen, a sport with some similarities to pole vaulting. A jump consists of an intense sprint to the pole (polsstok), jumping and grabbing it, then climbing to the top while trying to control the pole's forward and lateral movements over a body of water and finishing with a graceful landing on a sand bed opposite to the starting point. Because of all the diverse skills required in fierljeppen, fierljeppers are considered to be very complete athletes with superbly developed strength and coordination. In the warmer months, many Frisians practicewadlopen, the traditional art of wading across designated sections of theWadden Sea at low tide.Friesland has lots of waterways and lakes there for Sailcontests with a Skutsje or frisian Tjalk is done during the summer on various lakes.
There are currently two professionalfootball clubs playing in Friesland:SC Cambuur from Leeuwarden (home stadiumCambuur Stadion) active in de keuken kampioen divisie(2nd div.) andSC Heerenveen (home stadiumAbe Lenstra Stadion) active in de Eredivisie(1st div.).
Friesland has been made more popular in the media thanks to Fryslân musician and rapperJoost Klein, who participated in theEurovision Song Contest in 2024. He has released many songs about his home province, such as a cover of the 1993 songFriesenjung (lit.'Frisian boy') and also often mentions it in his lyrics.
John Hines & Nelleke IJssennagger (eds.),Frisians and their North Sea Neighbours: From the Fifth Century to the Viking Age, Boydell & Brewer, Woodbridge/Rochester 2017
Goffe Jensma, 'Minorities and Kinships. The Case of Ethnolinguistic Nationalism in Friesland’, in: P. Broomans et al. (eds.),The Beloved Mothertongue. Ethnolinguistic Nationalism in Small Nations: Inventories and Reflections, Peeters, Louvain-Paris-Dudley 2008, p. 63-78
Horst Haider Munske (ed.),Handbuch des Friesischen / Handbook of Frisian Studies, Max Niemeyer, Tübingen 2001
Oebele Vries, 'Frisonica libertas: Frisian Freedom as an Instance of Medieval Liberty', in:Journal of Medieval History 41 (2015), nr. 2, p. 229-248
^Homans describes Frisian social institutions, based on the summary bySiebs, Benno E. (1933).Grundlagen und Aufbau der altfriesischen Verfassung. Untersuchungen zur deutschen staats- und Rechtsgeschichte (in German). Vol. 144. Breslau: Marcus.OCLC604057407. Siebs' synthesis was extrapolated from survivals detected in later medieval documents.[24]
^"Beslut fan Provinsjale Staeten van Friesland" [Resolution of the Provincial Council of Friesland].Provinciaal Blad van Friesland (in Western Frisian) (7). 28 March 1996.
^Brand, A. J. (2011). "Frisians". In Cole, J. E. (ed.).Ethnic Groups of Europe: An Encyclopedia. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-Clio. p. 150.ISBN978-1-59884-302-6.
^Pliny the Elder & 79_3:340–341,Natural History, Bk XVI Ch 2: Wonders connected with trees in the northern regions.
^Tacitus 117:253,The Annals, Bk XIII, Ch 54. Events of AD 54–58. This was confirmed byTacitus when he said that in an incident where the Frisii had taken over land, they then settled into houses, sowed the fields, and cultivated the soil.
^Tacitus 117:147–148,The Annals, Bk IV, Ch 72–74. Events of AD 15–16. Tacitus specifically refers to the herds of the Frisii.
^Tacitus & 98:18–19, 23–24, 36–37,The Germany, Ch V, VII, XVI.
^Tacitus 117:253,The Annals, Bk XIII, Ch 54. Events of AD 54–58.
^Minahan, James (2000).One Europe, many nations : a historical dictionary of European national groups. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press. p. 264.ISBN9780313309847.
^Grane, Thomas (2007), "From Gallienuso Probus - Three decades of turmoil and recovery",The Roman Empire and Southern Scandinavia–a Northern Connection! (PhD thesis), Copenhagen: University of Copenhagen, p. 109
^abHalbertsma, Herrius (1982)."Summary"(PDF).Frieslands Oudheid (Thesis) (in Dutch and English). Groningen: Rijksuniversiteit Groningen. pp. 791–798.OCLC746889526. Archived fromthe original(PDF) on 1 October 2013. Retrieved22 June 2017.
^Heinrich Schmidt:Politische Geschichte Ostfrieslands. 1975, p. 22 ff.
^Medieval Germany: An Encyclopedia, John M. Deep, Pub. 2001, Germany.
^Markus Meumann, Jörg Rogge (Hg.). Die besetzte "res publica". Zum Verhältnis von ziviler Obrigkeit und militärischer Herrschaft in besetzten Gebieten vom Spätmittelalter bis zum 18. Jahrhundert, Pg. 137. Papers from a conference held 20–21 Sep 2001, at the Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg. By Markus Meumann, Jörg Rogge. Published 2006 LIT Verlag Berlin -Hamburg-Münster.
^The New Encyclopædia Britannica, Published by Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 1993, p. 214.
^The Dutch Republic in the Seventeenth Century: The Golden Age by Maarten Prak, Pub 2005
^The encyclopedia of Medieval literature in Britain. Siân Echard, Robert Allen Rouse, Jacqueline A. Fay, Helen Fulton, Geoff Rector. Hoboken. 2017.ISBN978-1-118-39695-7.OCLC968246572.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
^Alighieri, Dante.Divine Comedy, "Inferno", Canto 31, line 64, inThe Portable Dante, ed. Paolo Milano, trans. Laurence Binyon, Penguin, 1975ISBN0-14-015032-3
^Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017)."Stellingwerfs".Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
^Hilton, N. H., & Gooskens, C. (2013). Language policies and attitudes towards Frisian in the Netherlands. Phonetics in Europe: Perceptions and production, 139-157.
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