Zeeland
Webpages concerning "Zeeland"
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Wikipedia-Article "Zeeland"
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| Capital | Middelburg |
| Queen's Commissioner | drs. W.T. (Wim) van Gelder |
| Religion (1999) | Protestant 35% Catholic 23% |
| Area - Land - Water |
10th 1.788 km² 1.146 km² |
| Population - Total - Density |
11th 379.948 (2005) 212 /km² |
| Anthem | Zeeuws volkslied |
| Official website | www.zeeland.nl |
- For the South Pacific country named after the province, see New Zealand (some notes on how New Zealand got its name are underneath).
- For the Danish Island, see Zealand.
- For the U.S. towns of Zeeland, see Zeeland, Michigan and Zeeland, North Dakota respectively.
Zeeland is a province of the Netherlands. The province, located in the south-west of the country, consists of a number of islands (hence its name, meaning "sea-land") and a strip bordering Belgium. Its capital is Middelburg. Its population is about 380,000 and its area is about 2930 km², of which almost 1140 km² is water.
Large parts of Zeeland are below sealevel. The last great flooding of the area was in 1953. Tourism is an important economic activity. Its sunny beaches make it a popular holiday destination in the summer. Most tourists are Germans. In some areas, the population quadruples in the summer.
The coat of arms of Zeeland shows a lion half-emerged from water, and the text "luctor et emergo" (Latin for "I struggle and I emerge" (referring to land reclamation)).
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Constituent parts
From north to south, it consists of
- Schouwen-Duiveland
- Tholen
- Noord-Beveland
- Walcheren, Zuid-Beveland
- Zeeuws-Vlaanderen (Dutch Flanders)
Municipalities
A list of the municipalities, with links to maps:
- Borsele
- Goes [1]
- Hulst
- Kapelle [2]
- Middelburg [3]
- Noord-Beveland [4]
- Reimerswaal [5]
- Schouwen-Duiveland [6]
- Sluis
- Terneuzen
- Tholen
- Veere [7]
- Flushing (Vlissingen) [8]
History
Zeeland has been a contested area between the counts of Holland and Flanders until 1299, when the count of Holland gained control of the county of Zeeland. Since then, Zeeland followed the fate of Holland. In 1432 it became part of the Low Countries possessions of Philip the Good of Burgundy, the later Seventeen Provinces. Through marriage, the Seventeen Provinces became property of the Habsburgs in 1477.
In the Eighty Years' War Zeeland was on the side of the Union of Utrecht, and became one of the United Provinces. The area now called Zeeuws-Vlaanderen was not part of Zeeland, but a part of Flanders that was conquered by the United Provinces: Staats-Vlaanderen (see: Generality Lands).
After the French occupation (see Bouches-de-l'Escaut) and the formation of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1815, the present province Zeeland was formed. The catastrophic North Sea Flood of 1953, which killed over 1,000 people in Zeeland, led to the construction of the protective Delta Works.
Transportation
There is one passenger railway, line 12, here with municipalities and official station abbreviations:
Vlissingen (vs, vss) - Middelburg (mdb, arn) - Goes (gs) - Kapelle (bzl) - Reimerswaal (krg, kbd, rb) - connecting to Bergen op Zoom (bgn) (Noord-Brabant).
Bus connections (of Connexxion, except # 395) include:
- bus 133: Vlissingen - Middelburg - Vrouwenpolder - Oosterscheldedam - Renesse - Zierikzee - Grevelingendam - connecting to Oude-Tonge, Rotterdam-Zuidplein
- Interliner Express bus 395: Zierikzee - (Grevelingendam) - connecting to Rotterdam-Zuidplein
- bus 104: Renesse - Brouwersdam - connecting to Ouddorp - Spijkenisse
- bus 20 and 50: see Westerschelde.
Zeeland and New Zealand
The country of New Zealand (Māori name: Aotearoa), was first made known to Europeans by Dutch navigator Abel Tasman. He named it Staten Landt, believing it to be part of the land of that name off Argentina. When that was shown not to be so, Dutch authorities named it Nova Zeelandia in Latin, followed by Nieuw Zeeland in Dutch, which Captain James Cook subsequently called New Zealand in English language. The name is only one letter away from the literal translation to English, New Sealand. The Z was possibly retained to partially preserve the Dutch pronuncation. It has also been suggested that Captain Cook assumed Nieuw Zeeland was named after the island of Zealand, Denmark. New Zealand is more than 100 times larger than Zeeland and has about 10 times the population.
See Also
External links
- Province government
- Map, also showing municipalities: http://www.zeeland.nl/getfile.php?/zeeland/kaarten/gemeenten/zeeland2003.pdf (2003) (pdf, 570 KB)
- Basic information: http://www.sdu.nl/staatscourant/scdata/prov/zeeland.htm (2002)
- province map showing subdivision in municipalities, link for each municipality to basic data page (2002)
- Geography of Zeeland
- Deltaworks Online - Flood protection of Zeeland and Deltaregion
| Provinces of the Netherlands (ranked lists) |  |
|---|---|
| Drenthe | Flevoland | Friesland | Gelderland | Groningen | Limburg | North Brabant | North Holland | Overijssel | South Holland | Utrecht | Zeeland | |