933 - Dirk III
Arnulf was count till 993, and his son, Dirk III, a boy, on his accession found things in great confusion; the fiefs held under France were gone, and much besides. But the young count was full of vigor, and grew at last so strong that in 1018 the emperor ordered the duke of Nether Lotharingia to crush him. Dirk, however, completely defeated his assailant, and not only retained the disputed lands and powers, but added thereto Bodegrave, the Merwede, and Swammerdam, as fiefs of the church at Utrecht.
It is here that the true history of Holland begins; for Dirk III now firmly settled himself in this district, and became lord of the rich woodland ("Holt-land," i.e., Holland) on the Rhine and Meuse. Having also subdued the Frisians and set his brother over them, he next went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and after his return in 1031 ruled in peace till his death in 1039.
His son, Dirk IV, was also a man of vigor; he began the long strife with the counts of Flanders as to the lordship over Walcheren and the other islands of Zealand; the quarrel was important, as dealing with the borderland between French and German overlordship. This strife, which lasted 400 years, did not at first break out into actual warfare, because both Dirk and Baldwin V of Flanders had a common danger in the emperor Henry III, who in 1046 occupied the lands in dispute; but while other opponents gave in, Dirk, after the manner of his house, stood out, and in the winter of 1017 with his light boats took the imperial fleet, ruined the imperial army, and dictated his own terms. In 1049, in a fresh contest with the bishop of Utrecht and his allies, Dirk IV met with his death at Dort.
His brother, Floris I, succeeded, and carried on the quarrel; in 1061 he was slain on the battlefield, after having won a decisive victory over the bishop. His son, Dirk V, was a child, and the neighboring princes thought the end of the house of Holland at hand; and though the boy had stout friends, especially Robert "the Frisian," who had married his widowed mother, his prospects were at first very gloomy. The battle of Cassel, however, in 1072, in which Robert the Frisian defeated Philip of France and Richilda of Flanders, secured his possessions for Dirk, who henceforth saw better days, and ruled in peace till his death in 1091.
His son, Floris II, the Fat, had also peace, and at his death in 1122 left Holland in great prosperity. His widow, Petronilla of Saxony, governed for her young son Dirk VI, and continued the joint resistance of Holland and Saxony to the Franconian emperors. But when, on the death of Henry V, Lothair of Saxony became emperor, this quarrel came to an end, and the fortunes of the house of Holland rose greatly; the Frisian Ostergow and Westergow were transferred from the bishop of Utrecht to Count Dirk in 1125.
The Hohaustaufen, on the contrary, favored the bishop, and gave back the two "gows"; and thus, with gain and loss, Dirk VI ruled until he died in 1157. It was in his time that Holland sent out her first colonists; invited by Adolf of Holstein and Albert the Bear of Brandenburg, Hollanders settled on the Elbe and the Havel, and by their skill in reclaiming marshlands, and their thrift and vigor, created a flourishing district out of a waste of wood and water.
Floris III, the next count, allied himself with Frederick Barbarossa, thus reversing the traditional policy of his house. He was less fortunate than his fathers; the count of Flanders carried off a slice of his territory; he scarcely held his own against West Friesland and Groningen; his reign was marked by the great flood of 1170, which swept over Holland, Friesland, and Utrecht, and helped to form the Zuyder Zee. Later in life Floris followed the emperor on crusade, and soon after the death of the latter, perished in 1190 of pestilence at Antioch.
His son, Dirk VII, had a stormy time, losing rather than gaining in the longrun. He died in 1203, leaving an only daughter, Ada, with whom came up the question as to female succession to a male fief. Zealand mainly declared for William, the late count's brother, while Holland went with Ada; by 1206, however, William had beaten down all opposition, and was undisputed count. He sided with the emperor William Otto IV, and was present at Bouvines (1214), where Philip Augustus crushed the allied forces of Otto, John of England, Flanders, Holland, and Brabant. Soon after this William changed sides, and, attaching himself to Philip Augustus, accompanied Louis to England.
After King John's death he joined the fourth crusade, in which his men distinguished themselves greatly at the siege of Damietta in 1219. Returning thence he reigned in peace until his death in 1224. His reign is notable by reason of the civic charters he granted — one to Geertruidenberg in 1213, another celebrated one to Middelburg in Zealand in 1217. These charters were the models on which later ones were framed; they secured the existing liberties of towns, gave the burghers the right of being ruled by law, and established equal justice within the walls.
William was succeeded by Floris IV, murdered at Corbie Floris in 1235; his son, William II, was a man of mark. Pope Innocent IV, having deposed Frederick II, and wanting a prince to sit up against the Hohenstaufen, thought that the young count of Holland might serve, and accordingly had him elected king of the Romans by an assembly composed chiefly of German ecclesiastics. He took Aix-la-Chapelle, and was there crowned king in 1248; and after Frederick's death in 1250 he had a considerable party in Germany. His foreign ambitions were, however, crossed by troubles at home, and before he received the imperial crown he perished in West Friesland, going down, horse and armor, through the ice. It was he who fixed the seat of government at the Hague.
His successor was Floris V, a babe. The father had been a young man of unusual promise, ruined by German politics; the son was destined to play a considerable part in Netherland history. Hitherto Holland had dealt only with smaller neighbors, Flanders, Friesland, Utrecht, or Guelderland; henceforward she takes part in European questions, interfering in the great strife between Edward I of England and France.
For when he came of age Floris allied himself closely with the English king, and secured great trading advantages for his people; the staple of wool was placed at Dort, and the Hollanders and Zealanders got fishing rights on the English coast to balance the power of the nobles, which mure and more took the form of oppression, he also granted charters to towns (notably to Amsterdam), and forwarded their growth.
In 1296, finding that Edward of England was dealing with his rival of Flanders, Floris joined Philip the Fair of France; but this act and his severities towards the nobles led to a conspiracy, to which he fell a victim; the burghers and people, who knew him to be their best friend, took such vengeance on his slayers as permanently reduced the power of the nobles.
John I, his son, was in England when his father was murdered; he was a feeble boy in body and mind, married to the daughter of Edward I. His reign was a struggle between Zealand, led by Wolfart van Borselen, and Holland, guided by John of Avennes, the young count's guardian and next heir. In 1299 Van Borselen was killed by the Hollanders, and soon after Count John died. John of Avennes was at once recognized as count by the Hollanders, and with John I ended the first line of counts, after a rule of nearly 400 years.
Europe has perhaps never seen an abler series of princes; excepting the last, there was not one weak man among them; they were ready fighters, brave crusaders, handsome well-built persons, with high chivalrous gifts tainted with corresponding chivalrous vices; they were all ready to advance the commerce of the country; they were the friends of the people, the supporters of the growing towns. They made their marsh lands fertile, and raised Holland to be a companion of kings.
