Comments by "Lynott Parris" (@DenUitvreter) on "RealLifeLore" channel.

The Netherlands was called the anus of the world. It was one of the most inhabitable places on the planet that was inhabited. Once the solutions were found to build there, levees, dams, canals, locks, bricks, poles for foundation, it seems easy but it never was. We still have several towers as skew as the tower of Pisa.
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@jamjamme The Dutch had more merchant ships trading in Europe than the rest of Europe combined. The safe and frequent European bulk trade was far, far bigger than the global trade with it's year of sailing and many dangers. In the high risk high reward colonial trade the English and other European powers could compete a bit, in the European trade the efficient Dutch ships, build 30 times faster thanks to the invention of the saw mill in 1592 by a Dutch peasant, and low interest rates thanks to the Dutch central banking were a competitive edge no one could match. The Dutch would also do lots of the trade between Poland and Norway for example, or between two Swedish ports.
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Those major powers did attack several times, even together, but mostly failed. Partly because it was in the time war was fought by mercenaries and the Dutch were rich so their small population didn't matter. It was one of the powerful countries itself. It also had the best sailors, the navy was compromised, big gun ships had too much drought for the shallow home waters but that was compensated for with tactics. Als the West part of the country with it's ports could be and was protected by flooding the surrounding farm fields. That protected the Netherlands until the aircraft technology of WWII. Napoleon's invasion succeeded because it was an exceptionally harsh winter and the flooded area froze over quicker than the Dutch could break the ice. The Dutch Republic was the biggest economic power for over a century because it dominated all European trade, they basically took over the Hanseatic League with their industrialized ship building en the early modern capitalists, no one could compete. The spice trade was tiny in comparison. Actually the VOC, the "Dutch East India Company" started out to defend against the most powerful country in Europe, the trade financing the military presence to fight the Portuguese, who were part of the Spanish Empire. The Dutch Republic was the first modern country basically, and shaped the world through it's capitalism and freedom to fit it's own geography. But as an Amercian you probably learned European history from the English, who like to pretend they were always first in everything and at the centre of everything. Not in the 17th and 16th century they were.
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@lieke9374 The Dutch Golden Age was from the 1570's to the 1670's and the VOC had little to do with it.
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And just making stuff up. 2.13 'plenty of invasions going this way' (to the Dutch Republic). No, I don't believe setting a harbour on fire and have a small massacre on a small coastal Island in a naval war counts as an invasion but even if so there is no 'plenty of invasions'. There has been one proper invasion and that went the other way, resulting in the Dutch taking London and giving the British the constitutional monarchy that lasts until this day, together with the bill of rights. What's invasive here is the English 17th and 18th propaganda into proper history, just like it is in general.
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@sirBrouwer Globally you mean? Also the VOC did most of it's trade within Asia indeed.
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If it's any consolation, the video is wrong on 2.15. There haven't been plenty of invasions in that direction, there have been naval wars and Britain plundered a village on a coastal island once, but that's about it. The Dutch Republic got into Britain with the raid on chatham in 1667, but actaully invaded and occupied England in 1688, took the throne, gave them their current constitutional monarchy, bill of rights and Bank of England. Arch rivals? The Dutch dominated all of European trade, the English couldn't compete so they started naval wars. A bit flattering to the British to call that an arch rivalry.
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@inisipisTV It's simply not true what the video says. Yes, the Dutch Republic was the envy of the English, no they couldn't rival them and there weren't many invasions going that direction. There were naval wars but the English didn't dare sailing 'inland' because their ships had to much draught for the shallow waters. There were was one spectacular raid inland the other way around, Chatham, and there was a Dutch invasion and occupation, which caused the British to take over later. Nothing of course about it.The Portuguese dominated an era much earlier.
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@lenjon7478 It had citizens instead of subjects to a monarch, and what makes it stand out for it's time economically was the upward social mobility and the broad, big spending middle class. Holland profitted the most but also did Zealand, Groningen, Friesland and Overrijssel. The wetter the place, the more waterways, the more they profitted from trade. So Gelderland and Brabant fell a bit behind. But look at the Dutch masters, not just the ordinary families they depicted, but also the fact that they stood on top of masses of mediocre painters. Ordinary people could afford those mediocre paintings, and books too.
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