1.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
2.
Dutch Republic
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It preceded the Batavian Republic, the Kingdom of Holland, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, and ultimately the modern Kingdom of the Netherlands. Alternative names include the United Provinces, Seven Provinces, Federated Dutch Provinces, most of the Low Countries had come under the rule of the House of Burgundy and subsequently the House of Habsburg. In 1549 Holy Roman Emperor Charles V issued the Pragmatic Sanction, Charles was succeeded by his son, King Philip II of Spain. This was the start of the Eighty Years War, in 1579 a number of the northern provinces of the Low Countries signed the Union of Utrecht, in which they promised to support each other in their defence against the Spanish army. This was followed in 1581 by the Act of Abjuration, the declaration of independence of the provinces from Philip II. In 1582 the United Provinces invited Francis, Duke of Anjou to lead them, but after an attempt to take Antwerp in 1583. After the assassination of William of Orange, both Henry III of France and Elizabeth I of England declined the offer of sovereignty, however, the latter agreed to turn the United Provinces into a protectorate of England, and sent the Earl of Leicester as governor-general. This was unsuccessful and in 1588 the provinces became a confederacy, the Union of Utrecht is regarded as the foundation of the Republic of the Seven United Provinces, which was not recognized by the Spanish Empire until the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. During the Anglo-French war, the territory was divided into groups, the Patriots, who were pro-French and pro-American and the Orangists. The Republic of the United Provinces faced a series of revolutions in 1783–1787. During this period, republican forces occupied several major Dutch cities, initially on the defence, the Orangist forces received aid from Prussian troops and retook the Netherlands in 1787. After the French Republic became the French Empire under Napoleon, the Batavian Republic was replaced by the Napoleonic Kingdom of Holland, the Netherlands regained independence from France in 1813. In the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 the names United Provinces of the Netherlands, on 16 March 1815, the son of stadtholder William V crowned himself King William I of the Netherlands. Between 1815 and 1890 the King of the Netherlands was also in a union the Grand Duke of the sovereign Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. After Belgium gained its independence in 1830, the state became known as the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The County of Holland was the wealthiest and most urbanized region in the world, the free trade spirit of the time received a strong augmentation through the development of a modern, effective stock market in the Low Countries. The Netherlands has the oldest stock exchange in the world, founded in 1602 by the Dutch East India Company, while Rotterdam has the oldest bourse in the Netherlands, the worlds first stock exchange, that of the Dutch East-India Company, went public in six different cities. Later, a court ruled that the company had to reside legally in a city so Amsterdam is recognized as the oldest such institution based on modern trading principles
3.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
4.
Second Anglo-Dutch War
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After initial English successes, the war ended in a Dutch victory. It was part of a series of four Anglo-Dutch Wars fought between the English and the Dutch in the 17th and 18th centuries. The First Anglo-Dutch War was concluded with an English victory in the Battle of Scheveningen in August 1653, the Commonwealth government of Oliver Cromwell tried to avoid further conflict with the Dutch Republic. It did not come to the aid of its ally, Sweden, the Commonwealth was at war with Spain in the Anglo-Spanish War. The English feared Dutch intervention in this war on the side of the Spanish, in part, the leading personage of the Royal House of Orange was young Prince William who was the grandson of Charles I the lately beheaded king of England. Thus, the Commonwealth of England feared that the Orange party was under the influence of exiled English royalists, in reality, however, the Dutch Republic had only recently had its independence from Spain recognised, so had no desire to aid their hated former master. The Dutch were also building up their shipping and trading fleet again following the devastation of the First Anglo-Dutch War. While the English had won a great naval battles and destroyed a great many Dutch ships during the First Anglo-Dutch War. The real problem with the English trading system was that it was based on tariffs, Dutch goods were much more attractive around the world because they lacked the additional taxing on imports and exports that came with English goods. The end of the First Anglo-Dutch War had not changed this dynamic, indeed, the end of the war had set the United Provinces free to expand their trade while the English were still hindered by the same tariff system. Thus, another war seemed inevitable to many people of the time, as the Commonwealth was unlikely to give up its naval, the Treaty of Westminster itself planted the seeds of future conflict because of its secret annexe which contained the Act of Seclusion. The Act of Seclusion forbade the Province of Holland from installing any member of the House of Orange as their stadtholder, of course the most important province was Holland. Thanks to the influence that Johan de Witt could exert over the States-General, on May 4,1654, the Province of Holland passed its own Act of Exclusion. The Restoration of Charles II, in 1660, produced a surge of optimism in England. Many hoped to reverse the Dutch dominance in world trade, the Dutch, in this coordinated by Cornelis and Andries de Graeff, tried to placate the king with prodigious gifts, such as the Dutch Gift of 1660. Negotiations were started in 1661 to solve issues, which ended in the treaty of 1662. In 1663, Louis XIV of France stated his claim to portions of the Habsburg Southern Netherlands, during this time, Lord Clarendon, serving as chief minister to King Charles II of England, felt that France had become the greatest danger to England. In 1664, however, the situation quickly changed, clarendons enemy, Lord Arlington, became the favourite of the king and began to cooperate with the kings brother James, Duke of York, the Lord High Admiral
5.
Louis XIV of France
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Louis XIV, known as Louis the Great or the Sun King, was a monarch of the House of Bourbon who ruled as King of France and Navarre from 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the longest of any monarch of a country in European history. In the age of absolutism in Europe, Louis XIVs France was a leader in the centralization of power. Louis began his rule of France in 1661, after the death of his chief minister. By these means he became one of the most powerful French monarchs, under his rule, the Edict of Nantes, which granted rights to Huguenots, was abolished. The revocation effectively forced Huguenots to emigrate or convert in a wave of dragonnades, which managed to virtually destroy the French Protestant minority. During Louis reign, France was the leading European power, and it fought three wars, the Franco-Dutch War, the War of the League of Augsburg. There were also two lesser conflicts, the War of Devolution and the War of the Reunions, warfare defined Louis XIVs foreign policies, and his personality shaped his approach. Impelled by a mix of commerce, revenge, and pique, in peacetime he concentrated on preparing for the next war. He taught his diplomats their job was to create tactical and strategic advantages for the French military, Louis XIV was born on 5 September 1638 in the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, to Louis XIII and Anne of Austria. He was named Louis Dieudonné and bore the title of French heirs apparent. At the time of his birth, his parents had married for 23 years. His mother had experienced four stillbirths between 1619 and 1631, leading contemporaries thus regarded him as a divine gift and his birth a miracle of God. Sensing imminent death, Louis XIII decided to put his affairs in order in the spring of 1643, in defiance of custom, which would have made Queen Anne the sole Regent of France, the king decreed that a regency council would rule on his sons behalf. His lack of faith in Queen Annes political abilities was his primary rationale and he did, however, make the concession of appointing her head of the council. Louis relationship with his mother was uncommonly affectionate for the time, contemporaries and eyewitnesses claimed that the Queen would spend all her time with Louis. Both were greatly interested in food and theatre, and it is likely that Louis developed these interests through his close relationship with his mother. This long-lasting and loving relationship can be evidenced by excerpts in Louis journal entries, such as, but attachments formed later by shared qualities of the spirit are far more difficult to break than those formed merely by blood
6.
Michiel de Ruyter
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Michiel Adriaenszoon de Ruyter was a Dutch admiral. He is the most famous and one of the most skilled admirals in Dutch history and he fought the English and French and scored several major victories against them, the best known probably being the Raid on the Medway. It is said once, when he was a child. Not knowing that De Ruyter was there, some workers then removed the ladders, De Ruyter had to smash the tiles on the church roof to get into the church and out the door. In 1622, he fought as a musketeer in the Dutch army under Maurice of Nassau against the Spaniards during the relief of Bergen-op-Zoom and that same year he rejoined the Dutch merchant fleet and steadily worked his way up. According to English sources, he was active in Dublin between 1623 and 1631 as an agent for the Vlissingen-based merchant house of the Lampsins brothers, although Dutch sources have no data about his whereabouts in those years, it is known that De Ruyter spoke Irish fluently. He occasionally travelled as supercargo to the Mediterranean or the Barbary Coast, in those years, he usually referred to himself as Machgyel Adriensoon, his name in the Zealandic dialect he spoke, not having yet adopted the name De Ruyter. De Ruyter most probably was a given to him. In 1631, he married a daughter named Maayke Velders. The marriage lasted until the end of 1631, when Maayke died after giving birth to a daughter who died three weeks later, in 1633 and 1635, De Ruyter sailed as a navigating officer aboard the ship Groene Leeuw on whaling expeditions to Jan Mayen. At this point he did not yet have a command of his own, in the summer of 1636 he remarried, this time to a daughter of a wealthy burgher named Neeltje Engels, who gave him four children. One of these died shortly after birth, the others were named Adriaen, Neeltje, in the midst of this, in 1637, De Ruyter became captain of a private ship meant to hunt for raiders operating from Dunkirk who were preying on Dutch merchant shipping. He fulfilled this task until 1640, a Dutch fleet, with De Ruyter as third in command, beat back a Spanish-Dunkirker fleet in an action off Cape St Vincent on 4 November 1641. After returning, he bought his own ship, the Salamander, during this time, his esteem grew among other Dutch captains as he regularly freed Christian slaves by redeeming them at his own expense. In 1650, De Ruyters wife, who in 1649 had given him a son named Engel. On 8 January 1652, he married the widow Anna van Gelder and he bought a house in Flushing, but his blissful family life did not last long. During the First Anglo-Dutch War, De Ruyter was asked to join the fleet as a subcommander of a Zealandic squadron of directors ships. After initially refusing, De Ruyter proved his worth under supreme commander Lieutenant-Admiral Maarten Tromp and he also fought at the Battle of Kentish Knock and the Battle of the Gabbard
7.
New Netherland
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New Netherland was a 17th-century colonial province of the Seven United Netherlands that was located on the East Coast of North America. The colony was conceived as a business venture to exploit the North American fur trade. The settlement of New Sweden encroached on its flank, while its northern border was re-drawn to accommodate an expanding New England. During the 1650s, the colony experienced dramatic growth and became a port for trade in the North Atlantic. The surrender of Fort Amsterdam to England in 1664 was formalized in 1667, in 1673, the Dutch re-took the area but relinquished it under the Second Treaty of Westminster ending the Third Anglo-Dutch War the next year. The inhabitants of New Netherland were Native Americans, Europeans, and Africans, descendants of the original settlers played a prominent role in colonial America. For two centuries, New Netherland Dutch culture characterized the region, during the 17th century, Europe was undergoing expansive social, cultural, and economic growth, known as the Dutch Golden Age in the Netherlands. Nations vied for domination of trade routes around the globe. Simultaneously, philosophical and theological conflicts were manifested in military battles across the continent, the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands had become a home to many intellectuals, international businessmen, and religious refugees. He was turned back by the ice of the Arctic in his second attempt and he ended up exploring the waters off the east coast of North America aboard the vlieboot Halve Maen. His first landfall was at Newfoundland and the second at Cape Cod, Hudson believed that the passage to the Pacific ocean was between the St. Lawrence River and Chesapeake Bay, so he sailed south to the Bay then turned northward, traveling close along the shore. He first discovered Delaware Bay and began to sail upriver looking for the passage and this effort was foiled by sandy shoals, and the Halve Maen continued north. After passing Sandy Hook, Hudson and his crew entered the narrows into the Upper New York Bay, Hudson believed that he had found the continental water route, so he sailed up the major river which later bore his name, the Hudson. He found the water too shallow to proceed several days later, at the site of present-day Troy and his report was first published in 1611 by Emanuel Van Meteren, an Antwerp émigré and the Dutch Consul at London. This stimulated interest in exploiting this new resource, and it was the catalyst for Dutch merchant-traders to fund more expeditions. Flemish Lutheran émigré merchants such as Arnout Vogels sent the first follow-up voyages to exploit this discovery as early as July 1610. In 1611–1612, the Admiralty of Amsterdam sent two expeditions to find a passage to China with the yachts Craen and Vos, captained by Jan Cornelisz Mey and Symon Willemsz Cat. The results of explorations, surveys, and charts made from 1609 through 1614 were consolidated in Block’s map
8.
Suriname
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Suriname, officially known as the Republic of Suriname, is a sovereign state on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, at just under 165,000 square kilometers, it is the smallest country in South America. Suriname has a population of approximately 566,000, most of live on the countrys north coast, in and around the capital and largest city. Long inhabited by cultures of indigenous tribes, Suriname was explored and contested by European powers before coming under Dutch rule in the late 17th century. In 1954, the country one of the constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Its indigenous peoples have been active in claiming land rights and working to preserve their traditional lands. Suriname is considered to be a culturally Caribbean country, and is a member of the Caribbean Community, while Dutch is the official language of government, business, media, and education, Sranan, an English-based creole language, is a widely used lingua franca. Suriname is the territory outside Europe where Dutch is spoken by a majority of the population. The people of Suriname are among the most diverse in the world, spanning a multitude of ethnic, religious, and linguistic groups. This area was occupied by cultures of indigenous peoples long before European contact, remnants of which can be found in petroglyph sites at Werehpai. The name Suriname may derive from a Taino indigenous people called Surinen, British settlers, who founded the first European colony at Marshalls Creek along the Suriname River, spelled the name as Surinam. When the territory was taken over by the Dutch, it part of a group of colonies known as Dutch Guiana. The official spelling of the countrys English name was changed from Surinam to Suriname in January 1978, a notable example is Surinames national airline, Surinam Airways. The older English name is reflected in the English pronunciation, /ˈsʊrᵻnæm/ or /ˈsʊrᵻnɑːm/, in Dutch, the official language of Suriname, the pronunciation is, with the main stress on the third syllable and a schwa terminal vowel. Indigenous settlement of Suriname dates back to 3,000 BC, the largest tribes were the Arawak, a nomadic coastal tribe that lived from hunting and fishing. They were the first inhabitants in the area, the Carib also settled in the area and conquered the Arawak by using their superior sailing ships. They settled in Galibi at the mouth of the Marowijne River, while the larger Arawak and Carib tribes lived along the coast and savanna, smaller groups of indigenous peoples lived in the inland rainforest, such as the Akurio, Trió, Warrau, and Wayana. Beginning in the 16th century, French, Spanish, and English explorers visited the area, a century later, Dutch and English settlers established plantation colonies along the many rivers in the fertile Guiana plains
9.
Nutmeg
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Nutmeg is one of the two spices – the other being mace – derived from several species of tree in the genus Myristica. The most important commercial species is Myristica fragrans, a tree indigenous to the Banda Islands in the Moluccas of Indonesia. The first harvest of nutmeg trees takes place 7–9 years after planting, Nutmeg is usually used in powdered form. This is the tropical fruit that is the source of two different spices, obtained from different parts of the plant. Several other commercial products are produced from the trees, including essential oils, extracted oleoresins. The common or fragrant nutmeg, Myristica fragrans, is native to the Banda Islands in the Moluccas, other species used to adulterate the spice include Papuan nutmeg M. argentea from New Guinea, and M. malabarica from India. In the 17th-century work Hortus Botanicus Malabaricus, Hendrik van Rheede records that Indians learned the usage of nutmeg from the Indonesians through ancient trade routes, Nutmeg trees are dioecious plants which are propagated sexually and asexually, the latter being the standard. Sexual propagation by seedling yields 50% male seedlings, which are unproductive, epicotyl grafting, approach grafting, and patch budding have proved successful, with epicotyl grafting being the most widely adopted standard. Air-layering, or marcotting, is an alternative though not preferred method because of its low success rate, Nutmeg and mace have similar sensory qualities, with nutmeg having a slightly sweeter and mace a more delicate flavour. Mace is often preferred in light dishes for the bright orange, Nutmeg is used for flavouring many dishes, usually in ground or grated form, and is best grated fresh in a nutmeg grater. In Indonesian cuisine, nutmeg is used in dishes, mainly in many spicy soups, such as some variant of soto, konro, oxtail soup, sup iga, bakso. It is also used in gravy for meat dishes, such as beef stew, ribs with tomato, to European derived dishes such as bistik, rolade. Sliced nutmeg fruit flesh could be made as manisan, either wet, in Penang cuisine, dried, shredded nutmeg rind with sugar coating is used as toppings on the uniquely Penang ais kacang. Nutmeg rind is also blended or boiled to make iced nutmeg juice, in Indian cuisine, nutmeg is used in many sweet, as well as savoury, dishes. It is also added in quantities as a medicine for infants. It may also be used in quantities in garam masala. Ground nutmeg is also smoked in India, in Middle Eastern cuisine, ground nutmeg is often used as a spice for savoury dishes. In traditional European cuisine, nutmeg and mace are used especially in dishes and in processed meat products, they are also used in soups, sauces
10.
Banda Islands
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The main town and administrative centre is Bandanaira, located on the island of the same name. They rise out of 4-to-6-kilometre deep ocean and have a land area of approximately 180 square kilometres. They have a population of about 15,000, until the mid-19th century the Banda Islands were the worlds only source of the spices nutmeg and mace, produced from the nutmeg tree. The islands are popular destinations for scuba diving and snorkeling. The first documented presence in the Banda Islands comes from a rockshelter site on Pulau Ay that was in use at least 8000 years ago. Before the arrival of Europeans, Banda had a form of government led by orang kaya. Banda was the only source of nutmeg and mace, spices used as flavourings, medicines. They were sold by Arab traders to the Venetians for exorbitant prices, the traders did not divulge the exact location of their source and no European was able to deduce their location. The first written accounts of Banda are in Suma Oriental, a written by the Portuguese apothecary Tomé Pires who was based in Malacca from 1512 to 1515. On his first visit, he interviewed the Portuguese and the far more knowledgeable Malay sailors in Malacca and he estimated the early sixteenth century population to be 2500–3000. In exchange, Banda predominantly received rice and cloth, namely light cotton batik from Java, calicoes from India, in 1603, an average quality sarong-sized cloth traded for eighteen kilograms of nutmeg. Some of these textiles were then on-sold, ending up in Halmahera, coarser ikat from the Lesser Sundas was traded for sago from the Kei Islands, Aru and Seram. In August 1511 on behalf of the king of Portugal, Afonso de Albuquerque conquered Malacca, which at the time was the hub of Asian trade. In November of that year, after having secured Malacca and learning of the Bandas location, Malay pilots, either recruited or forcibly conscripted, guided them via Java, the Lesser Sundas and Ambon to Banda, arriving in early 1512. DAbreu sailed through Ambon and Seram while his second in command Francisco Serrão went ahead towards the Maluku islands, was shipwrecked and ended up in Ternate. Distracted by hostilities elsewhere in the archipelago, such as Ambon and Ternate, the Portuguese did not return until 1529, a Portuguese trader Captain Garcia Henriques landed troops in the Bandas. Five of the Banda islands were within gunshot of each other, the Bandanese were, however, hostile to such a plan, and their warlike antics were both costly and tiresome to Garcia whose men were attacked when they attempted to build a fort. From then on, the Portuguese were infrequent visitors to the islands preferring to buy their nutmeg from traders in Malacca, maintaining their independence, the Bandanese never allowed the Portuguese to build a fort or a permanent post in the islands
