The Founding of the NetherlandsApproximately twenty percent of the land area of ​​the Netherlands and twenty-one percent of its population are located below sea level, and fifty percent hundred of its lands are less than a meter away. above sea level (Molenaar) This makes the Netherlands, of all countries in the world, the country with the most land below sea level. The Netherlands currently has more than ten -seven thousand kilometers of flood defenses (Molenaar). The dikes were the foundation of the Netherlands because they made the Netherlands grow, made them famous and made them a pro at building them, but the dikes also hurt the Netherlands. There have not always been dikes in the Netherlands. Before the existence of dikes, low-lying lands overflowed at high tide. The inhabitants, hunters, fishermen and farmers, build artificial mounds to live and protect themselves. These mounds were called terpenes. As terpenes grew, entire villages and churches were built on them. There are still many villages in the Netherlands that started as a terp village. The word “terp” comes from an old Frisian word meaning village meaning height (Wintle). Churches have long been built on terpenes. Typically, the church was built on the highest point of the terp, so it was the most protected building in case of flooding. If the highest point was already built, a new terp was built next to the village, notably for the church (Wintle). This means that people fled to the church in case of flooding and the churches are the oldest buildings in Terpen. The terpen are a great help, but the soil is still wet. So Dutch inhabitants began to transform swamps and shallow lakes into habitable spaces. By erecting a dyke...... middle of paper...... and towards the inland rivers, this trade was made possible. The dikes are the foundation of the Netherlands. The Netherlands is made up of dikes, both literally and figuratively. Literally because the first houses were already built with terpenes. Later, dykes protected them. If there were no dikes, a large part of the Netherlands would have been submerged. Figuratively speaking, because they also derived their prosperity from the dikes. The extra land brought in revenue, mainly because building all those dikes made the Netherlands good at hydraulic engineering. And it gave the Netherlands the opportunity to help other countries with their flood defenses. The Netherlands would therefore not be the same without dikes. The dikes are part of the Netherlands and no one can change that. This gave the Dutch the opportunity to cycle through a Dutch polder and think that just a few meters above their heads there were fishermen fishing..