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Land reclamation in the 20th century added an additional 1,650 square kilometres (640 sq mi) to the country's land area. [3] Of the country's population, 21% lives in the 26% of the land located below mean sea level.
From 1200 to 1900 AD the Dutch reclaimed 940,000 acres (380,000 ha) of land from the sea and 345,000 acres (140,000 ha) by draining lakes, a total of 1,285,000 acres (520,000 ha), but lost 1,400,000 acres (570,000 ha) of land to the Zuiderzee. Hendrik Stevin in 1667 was the first to publish a study ("How the Fury of the North Sea may be stopped ...
This is illustrated by the saying "God created the world, but the Dutch created the Netherlands". [2] The Dutch have a long history of reclamation of marshes and fenland, resulting in some 3,000 polders [3] nationwide. By 1961, about half of the country's land, 18,000 square kilometres (6,800 sq mi), was reclaimed from the sea.
Created by land reclamation, its northeastern part was drained in 1955 and the remainder—the southwest—in 1968. Unlike other major polders, it is surrounded by lakes and below-sea-level channels. By some definitions, it is the world's largest artificial island. Levees, dikes, and pumping were used to drain the land.
The country can be split into two areas: the low and flat lands in the west and north, and the higher lands with minor hills in the east and south. The former, including the reclaimed polders and river deltas , make up about half of its surface area and are less than 1 metre (3.3 ft) above sea level, much of it actually below sea level.
Het Verdronken Land van Reimerswaal (translation: The Drowned Land of Reimerswaal) is an area of flood-covered land in Zeeland in the Netherlands between Noord Beveland and Bergen op Zoom. Some of it was lost in the St. Felix's Flood in 1530, and some of it in 1532. The Oosterschelde formerly flowed along its east and north edges.
The Afsluitdijk (literally translated: shut-off-dyke) was completed in 1932, thereby shutting off the Zuiderzee (lit: Southern Sea) from the North Sea. [4] Until then, the Zuiderzee had been a large bay south of the North Sea which gave maritime access to five provinces of The Netherlands, and particularly during the Dutch Golden Age provided a protected entrance and exit for the harbour of ...
Almost all of the land belonging to Flevoland was reclaimed in the 1950s and 1960s [5] while splitting the Markermeer and Bordering lakes from the IJsselmeer. As to dry land, it is the smallest province of the Netherlands at 1,410 km 2 (540 sq mi), but not gross land as that includes much of the waters of the fresh water lakes (meres) mentioned.