For the most part, the English name for a country is similar to the English name for the people who live there. The French live in France, Indonesians live in Indonesia, Rwandans live in Rwanda and so on. That’s not always the case, however. The people who live in the Netherlands are not Netherlandish or Netherlandians, they’re…Dutch. While it’s not too difficult to figure that out, the difference in nomenclature can reveal some interesting historical insights. Throw in the name Holland, and there’s even more complexity.
Here, we’ll dive into a little history behind each of these terms and figure out where they came from.
The Netherlands
The meaning of “Netherlands” isn’t too hard to guess. “Nether” means “low” and “lands” means “countries” (or, more simply, “lands”). The modern Dutch equivalent is Nederland, which means the same thing.
The name has been around for a long time, but the region was not always officially called that. The region that currently encompasses both the Netherlands and Belgium — sometimes called the Low Countries — has changed hands many times. One common thread in its naming, though, is that it often refers to the fact that the land is lower than the surrounding landmass. Back when it was a Roman territory in the first century CE, the area was called Germania Inferior (to contrast with the section of Germany called Germania Superior). When the Kingdom of Germany took over the area in the 10th century, it became Lower Lorraine. It wasn’t until the 15th century that Nederlandsch appears in the historical record, and at that point it referred to the language spoken by the people in the area. It also existed alongside the more common term for the people in the area, Duytsch (more on that below).
It took a few hundred more years for Nederlandsch to take hold as the official name for the region. In the 19th century, Belgium split off (taking the name Belgica from an old Latin name for the Low Countries), and the name Nederlandsch slowly started taking over from the other common name, Nederduytsch. Since then, it’s become the country’s moniker.
Dutch
The word Dutch comes from a Proto-Germanic word meaning “of the people.” It shares a root with the German word Deutsch, which has led to some confusing names. The name Germans call Germany, for example, is Deutschland and the people there Deutsch. Dutch and German are related, after all, both being Germanic languages. As mentioned in the last section, the Netherlands for a time was calledNederduytsch, meaning “of the lower people.”
The use of Dutch to refer to the people of the Netherlands doesn’t occur in most languages, however. English is the only language that calls the language spoken in the Netherlands “Dutch.” The Dutch themselves called their language Nederlands, and most other languages have some variation on that theme.
English has thrown around the word Dutch and its various spellings for hundreds of years. One lasting legacy of the willy nilly usage is Pennsylvania Dutch, which is the name for a branch of the German language that developed in North America. As far as the naming conventions involving the Netherlands goes, English is the odd one out.
Holland
The use of Holland to refer to the entirety of the Netherlands is also a quirk of English (though it’s done by some non-English speakers as well). The word derives from Old Dutch holt land, meaning “wood land,” and it specifically refers to one region of the Netherlands. Calling the Netherlands “Holland” is a bit like calling the United Kingdom “England.” People might not call you out if you happen to do so, but it’s not necessarily accurate.
There was one time that Holland was the name of the whole country: 1806 to 1810. That’s when Napoleon Bonaparte installed his brother as the puppet ruler of the country in an attempt to keep control of it. That’s likely not the reason why modern-day people call the country Holland, however. Instead, it’s probably that Holland was a largely autonomous region through much of its history, and so Holland got conflated with the country as a whole. At the same time, Holland — with its idyllic pastures and towering windmills — has become a cultural shorthand for the entire country in the modern world. Still, you should probably just call the Netherlands by its rightful name to avoid any problems.
Photo credit: Rentola.com
FAQs
The Old English cousin to Dutch, thiod or theod, simply meant “people or nation.” (This also helps explain why Germany is called Deutschland in German.) Over time, English-speaking people used the word Dutch to describe people from both the Netherlands and Germany, and now just the Netherlands today.
Why are Netherlands people called Dutch? ›
Dutch is used as the adjective for the Netherlands, as well as the demonym. The origins of the word go back to Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz, Latinised into Theodiscus, meaning "popular" or "of the people", akin to Old Dutch Dietsch or Old English þeodisc, meaning "(of) the common (Germanic) people".
Why do we say to Dutch? ›
To 'go Dutch' is a a contraction of 'In the Dutch fashion', meaning, 'To pay ones share'. Which seems to have been a natural response of traders from a small nation state being patronised by those of a larger neighbour.
Why is Holland now called Netherlands? ›
Because tourists primarily visit cities in the region of Holland, largely ignoring the other 10 provinces, the government has decided to work to attract focus on the country as a whole. The Dutch government is transitioning to using “The Netherlands” in all of its official branding.
What do you call a person from Holland? ›
The people of Holland are referred to as "Hollanders" in both Dutch and English, though in English this is now unusual. Today this refers specifically to people from the current provinces of North Holland and South Holland.
Do the Dutch call themselves Dutch? ›
In the Dutch language, the Dutch refer to themselves as Nederlanders.
Are Netherlands and Holland the same? ›
What is the difference between Holland and the Netherlands? Many people seem to think that the two names are interchangeable. But North Holland and South Holland are actually just two of the 12 provinces of the Netherlands, which is officially called the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
What does double dutch mean in slang? ›
nounSlang. unintelligible or garbled speech or language: She could have been talking double Dutch for all we understood of it.
What country are Dutch people from? ›
The Dutch are the people who live in the Netherlands, or those that come from the Netherlands. Often the Netherlands is called Holland, but this is only part of the Netherlands.
What 4 countries make up the Netherlands? ›
The Koninkrijk der Nederlanden (Kingdom of the Netherlands) is made up of 4 countries: Aruba, Curaçao, Sint Maarten and the Netherlands. The Netherlands includes 3 public bodies located in the Caribbean region: Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba.
The Netherlands has had steady natural gas resources since 1959, when a wellspring was discovered. Currently the Netherlands accounts for more than 25% of all natural gas reserves in the European Union. Over the following decades, the sale of natural gas generated a significant rise in revenue for the Netherlands.
What is the most common last name in the Netherlands? ›
One of the most common Dutch surnames is “de Jong", which is considered a patronymic name. Other common Dutch surnames are “Jansen” (derived from Jan's son) and “de Vries” (meaning “the freeze," referring to where a person came from, i.e. a toponym).
Are you Dutch if you're from Amsterdam? ›
But over time, English-speakers used 'Dutch' to refer to people from the area which is now the Netherlands and Germany, before separating into 'Low Dutch' (people from the lowlands – Belgium and the Netherlands) and 'High Dutch' – the Germans). To this day, we refer to people from the Netherlands as Dutch!
What do the Dutch call Amsterdam? ›
Mokum, without Aleph, is still commonly used as a nickname in the Netherlands for the city of Amsterdam. The nickname was first considered to be bargoens, a form of Dutch slang, but in the 20th century it lost its negative sound and is now used by Amsterdammers as a nickname for their city in a sentimental context.
Is Holland Dutch or Danish? ›
The Netherlands is sometimes called Holland, and this alone is enough to confuse a lot of people. People from The Netherlands are called Dutch. While it is acceptable to call a person from Denmark Danish, the correct term is Danes. The official language of The Netherlands is Dutch, while Denmark's is Danish.
Are Dutch people descended from Vikings? ›
Generally no. The Dutch people are largely descended from the native Germanic Batavians, who later were absorbed by the Franks, Saxons and Frisians.
Are Flemish and Dutch different? ›
Flemish is a dialect of Dutch and mostly spoken by Belgians in the North, specifically in the West Vlaanderen, Oost Vlaanderen, Antwerpen, Vlaams-Brabant and Limburg. They are mostly the same in terms of grammar and differ only in certain words and their pronunciation.
Why is Germany called Deutschland? ›
The etymology of Deutschland is pretty simple. The word deutsch comes from diutisc in Old High German, which means “of the people.” Land literally just means “land.” In other words, Deutschland basically means something to the effect of “the people's land.”
