NORTH HOLLAND, a Netherlands province, lying between the North sea and the Zuider Zee, and bounded southward by the provinces of South Holland and Utrecht. Three of the great new polders (see NETHERLANDS : Impoldering) will extend into the Zuider Zee from its eastern shore. The present area, including the islands of Texel, Vlieland and Terschelling, in the West Frisian group, as well as Wieringen, Marken and Urk in the Zuider Zee, is 1,065 sq.m. with pop. (1930) 1,509,587, showing an increase during the loth century from 9o5 per sq.m. to 1,417 per sq. mile. 'Three natural divisions can be recognized : (I) foreshore and sand-dunes, (2) inner dunes and the geest grounds, (3) low fens and clay lands. (See NETHERLANDS: Coast.) The dunes form a long, smooth, unbroken protection for the other regions, and the absence of deep inlets explains the absence of commercial towns. Ijmuiden is a small town and its recent creation was solely de pendent on its position at the exit of the artificial North sea canal from Amsterdam. Nevertheless, the broad, gently-sloping, sandy beach is admirable for sea-bathing, and permits the beach ing of the characteristic flat-bottomed fishing boats used at Zand voort and at smaller fishing villages. Bergen aan Zee, Egmond aan Zee and Wijk aan Zee are gay little unconventional resorts, the growing coastal children of the aged parent villages further inland. In the second zone, behind recently planted woods, espe cially along the margin of the geest grounds, from about 5 m. N. of Haarlem to io m. S., hyacinths, tulips, narcissi and crocuses, in exact squares of brilliant and varied colours, attract numerous tourists each spring-time, while market gardens provide valuable and continuous products for home and foreign trade.
This part of North Holland was early inhabited and contains many old towns and villages. Some of the most interesting are Haarlem (pop. 119,700), the seat of government of the old counts of Holland, and the scene of the great resistance of 1573—one of the most glorious failures in history. Near to Haarlem are the extensive red brick ruins of Brederode castle, the seat of an old and illustrious family. Nearer to the south border is Benne broek, the site of a loth century nunnery. Alkmaar (i.e., all water), (pop. 28,305), though originally belonging to the lowland zone, also has important historical associations, including its personal success against the Spaniards in the Eighty Years' War. Near Alkmaar are Schoorl—a village in the 9th century—Bergen, also of considerable antiquity, Heiloo, stated to be the site of a church built by St. Willibrord in the 8th century, and the villages of Beverwijk and Velsen. Other possessions of the same apostle
still remain, while Egmond, near by, was famed for its great abbey. Nearer Helder (pop. 29,426) is Schagen, a flourishing village in the 12th century, a lordship in the isth, but of no special importance to-day.
The third division comprises much the largest area, that lying at or below sea-level. Considerable land reclamation has been ef fected. To the north of the former Y (or Ij) the famous Purmer and Beemster lakes were drained in the beginning of the 17th century; but several sea-polders to the north of these were added to the mainland only in the first half of the 19th century. This region is traversed by the 46 m. North Holland canal (1819-25), between Amsterdam and Helder. The Y, formerly an inlet of the Zuider Zee, was drained, and the direct east to west 15 m.
North sea ship canal was cut in its stead (1865-76) ; in the south, Haarlem lake (72 sq.m.) was drained between 1840 and The landscape in this lowland division is more typically Dutch than elsewhere. The province is very poor in minerals, conse quently cattle-rearing and cheese manufacture (chiefly Edam) are the main industries, but agriculture and even market-gardening are also practised in the heavier clay lands of the polders. Purmer end, the natural focus of the Purmer, Wormer and Beemster polders, with street and canals too narrow to contain the present market-day produce, Alkmaar, the great cheese town with a famous weigh-house, and Enkhuizen, one of the "dead cities" of the Zuider Zee, are the chief market centres. The security offered by the Zuider Zee for trade and fishing was the prime factor in the commercial development of North Holland, and the cities of Medemblik, Enkhuizen, Hoorn, Edam and Monnikendam, though now of little more than local importance, possessed a large foreign commerce in the 16th and 17th centuries. This prosperity later concentrated itself upon the Y (that is, upon Amsterdam, q.v.) and upon the series of industrial settlements situated on its off shoot, the Zaan, of which Zaandam (pop. 33,184, with oil, saw, corn, cement and paper mills) is the most important.
Of the islands : Marken is rapidly learning how to commercialize its own quaintness, though it is not yet entirely spoiled ; micro scopic Urk has a population (about 3,000) largely dependent on the North sea fishery. Texel is noted for sheep and their products: wool and green cheese, and also for sea-birds' eggs, which are exported to Amsterdam. Vlieland and Terschelling are but slightly populated and relatively unimportant.