Dutch people
The Dutch, or Netherlanders, are an ethnic group native to the Netherlands. They share a common ancestry and culture and speak the Dutch language. Dutch people and their descendants are found in migrant communities worldwide, notably in Argentina, Aruba, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Caribbean Netherlands, Curaçao, Germany, Guyana, Indonesia, New Zealand, Sint Maarten, South Africa, Suriname, and the United States. The Low Countries were situated around the border of France and the Holy Roman Empire, forming a part of their respective peripheries and the various territories of which they consisted had become virtually autonomous by the 13th century. Under the Habsburgs, the Netherlands were organised into a single administrative unit, and in the 16th and 17th centuries the Northern Netherlands gained independence from Spain as the Dutch Republic. The high degree of urbanisation characteristic of Dutch society was attained at a relatively early date. During the Republic the first series of large-scale Dutch migrations outside of Europe took place.
The traditional arts and culture of the Dutch encompasses various forms of traditional music, dances, architectural styles and clothing, some of which are globally recognisable. Internationally, Dutch painters such as Rembrandt, Vermeer and Van Gogh are held in high regard. The predominant religion among the Dutch is Christianity, encompassing both Latin Catholicism and Calvinist Protestantism. However, in contemporary times, the majority no longer adhere to a particular Christian denomination. Significant percentages of the Dutch are adherents of humanism, agnosticism, atheism or individual spirituality.
History
Emergence
The general situation described above is applicable to most if not all modern European ethnic groups with origins among the Germanic tribes, such as the Frisians, Germans, English and the Nordic peoples. In the Low Countries, this phase began when the Franks, themselves a union of multiple smaller tribes, began to incur the northwestern provinces of the Roman Empire. Eventually, in 358, the Salian Franks, one of the three main subdivisions among the Frankish alliance, settled the area's Southern lands as foederati; Roman allies in charge of border defense.File:Evangeliarum van Egmond.jpg|thumb|right|The Egmond Gospels contains the oldest known depiction of Dutch individuals, the count Dirk II of Holland and his wife Hildegard of Flanders.
Linguistically Old Frankish gradually evolved into Old Dutch, which was first attested in the 6th century, whereas religiously the Franks converted to Christianity from around 500 to 700. On a political level, the Frankish warlords abandoned tribalism and founded a number of kingdoms, eventually culminating in the Frankish Empire of Charlemagne.
However, the population make-up of the Frankish Empire, or even early Frankish kingdoms such as Neustria and Austrasia, was not dominated by Franks. Though the Frankish leaders controlled most of Western Europe, the Franks themselves were confined to the Northwestern part of the Empire. Eventually, the Franks in Northern France were assimilated by the general Gallo-Roman population, and took over their dialects, whereas the Franks in the Low Countries retained their language, which would evolve into Dutch. The current Dutch-French language border has remained virtually identical ever since, and could be seen as marking the furthest pale of gallicisation among the Franks. A dialect continuum remaining with more eastern Germanic populations, a distinct identity in relation to these only gradually developed, largely based on socio-economic and political factors. Large parts of the present Netherlands have populations using Saxon and Frisian dialects.
Convergence
The medieval cities of the Low Countries, especially those of Flanders, Brabant and Holland, which experienced major growth during the 11th and 12th centuries, were instrumental in breaking down the already relatively loose local form of feudalism. As they became increasingly powerful, they used their economic strength to influence the politics of their nobility. During the early 14th century, beginning in and inspired by the County of Flanders, the cities in the Low Countries gained huge autonomy and generally dominated or greatly influenced the various political affairs of the fief, including marriage succession.While the cities were of great political importance, they also formed catalysts for medieval Dutch culture. Trade flourished, population numbers increased dramatically, and education was no longer limited to the clergy. Flanders, Brabant and Holland began to develop a common Dutch standard language. Dutch epic literature such as Elegast, the Song of Roland and Reynard the Fox were widely enjoyed. The various city guilds as well as the necessity of water boards in the Dutch delta and coastal regions resulted in an exceptionally high degree of communal organisation. It is also around this time, that ethnonyms such as Diets and Nederlands emerge.
In the second half of the 14th century, the dukes of Burgundy gained a foothold in the Low Countries through the marriage in 1369 of Philip the Bold of Burgundy to the heiress of the Count of Flanders. This was followed by a series of marriages, wars, and inheritances among the other Dutch fiefs and around 1450 the most important fiefs were under Burgundian rule, while complete control was achieved after the end of the Guelders Wars in 1543, thereby unifying the fiefs of the Low Countries under one ruler. This process marked a new episode in the development of the Dutch ethnic group, as now political unity started to emerge, consolidating the strengthened cultural and linguistic unity.
Consolidation
Despite their growing linguistic and cultural unity, and economic similarities, there was still little sense of political unity among the Dutch people.However, the centralist policies of Burgundy in the 14th and 15th centuries, at first violently opposed by the cities of the Low Countries, had a profound impact and changed this. During Charles the Bold's many wars, which were a major economic burden for the Burgundian Netherlands, tensions slowly increased. In 1477, the year of Charles' sudden death at Nancy, the Low Countries rebelled against their new liege, Mary of Burgundy, and presented her with a set of demands.
The subsequently issued Great Privilege met many of these demands, which included that Dutch, not French, should be the administrative language in the Dutch-speaking provinces under Burgundian rule and that the States-General had the right to hold meetings without the monarch's permission or presence. The overall tenor of the document aimed for more autonomy for the counties and duchies, but nevertheless all the fiefs presented their demands together, rather than separately. This is evidence that by this time a sense of common interest was emerging among the provinces of the Netherlands. The document itself clearly distinguishes between the Dutch speaking and French speaking provinces.
Following Mary's marriage to Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, the Netherlands were now part of the Habsburg lands. Further centralised policies of the Habsburgs again met with resistance, but, peaking with the formation of the collateral councils of 1531 and the Pragmatic Sanction of 1549 creating the Seventeen Provinces, were still implemented. The rule of Philip II of Spain sought even further centralist reforms, which, accompanied by religious dictates and excessive taxation, resulted in the Dutch Revolt. The Dutch provinces, though fighting alone now, for the first time in their history found themselves fighting a common enemy. This, together with the growing number of Dutch intelligentsia and the Dutch Golden Age in which Dutch culture, as a whole, gained international prestige, consolidated the Dutch as an ethnic group.