Top 10 the Nether­lands facts

Women were allowed to participate in athletic competitions. The decision to include women in athletic competitions was widely criticised not only by the majority of the sport community, but also by Vatican.

New Amsterdam. In 1625 the Dutch established the Nieuw Amsterdam housing estate in Manhattan. The English won it in 1664 and renamed it New York. In 1673, the Dutch again regained the city, but gave the English a year later in exchange for the recognition of the rights to Suriname.

The Netherlands. Hutspot is a dish of boiled and mashed potatoes, carrots and onions with a long history in traditional Dutch cuisine. It is a very popular dish during the cold winter days, usually served with klapstuk, a piece of braised beef.

Rotterdam. The Erasmus Bridge is a reflection of the industrial character of Rotterdam and helps in organizing traffic flows, operating as a last crossing point between the Northern and Southern parts of the city. It was used in several recognizable events such as Tour de France or Red Bull Air Race.

Dancer and courtesan. Margaretha Geertruida "Margreet" MacLeod , better known by the stage name Mata Hari was a Dutch exotic dancer and courtesan who was convicted of being a spy for Germany during World War I and executed by firing squad in France

18. Max Verstappen won the 2016 Spanish Grand Prix in his debut race for Red Bull Racing at the age of 18, becoming the youngest-ever winner of a Grand Prix in the Formula One history.

Of people who were accused of practicing witchcraft. Between 1550 and about 1690 people accused of witchcraft were at times brought to a weigh house in order to be subjected to a "witch test" to "prove" their innocence for payment (as nobody was deemed to be a witch after this test). If a person was found to be lighter than a set weight, he or she was deemed guilty. This is similar to the use of a ducking stool.

Pieter Jansz. Saenredam was a painter of the Dutch Golden Age. His paintings frequently show medieval churches, usually Gothic, but sometimes late Romanesque, which had been stripped bare of their original decorations after the iconoclasm of the Protestant Reformation. He wanted to record this time of change by documenting the country’s buildings.

Netherlands. France has the shortest border with ... Holland. The border is 13 km (8.08 mi) long. Saint Martin is an island in the Caribbean Sea, is divided between the French Republic and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, but the two parts are roughly equal in population. The division dates to 1648.

In the Netherlands and Belgium. Baarle is a village whose territory is divided into a patchwork of Belgian and Dutch territories. The Belgian part includes 16 exclaves within Dutch territory. The borders of these enclaves, however, do not run straight, they cut houses in half, divide buildings, gardens and shops with borders, marked by white crosses on the ground, that often cut through the middle of buildings and homes. For these properties, the voordeurregel (literally: "front door rule") policy applies: their address lies in the country that contains their front door.