Cities aren't actually a subdivision of the Netherlands. Cities are also municipalities or they make part of municipalities.
This is a list of the cities with over 100,000 people.
In fact a large part of the Netherlands was created by the sand that came from the many rivers flowing through it. Notable Dutch rivers are the Rhine, the Maas, the IJssel and the Scelt. A large part of the Netherlands is below sea level. This is because the Dutch have made many lakes and parts of the sea dry, creating polders. Therefore, there is a saying "God created the earth, but the Dutch created the Netherlands." This makes the Netherlands very flat. In the very south-east of the Netherlands, in Limburg, there are some hills. Therefore, this region is a tourist-attraction for many Dutch people. The highest point in the European portion of the Netherlands, the Vaalserberg, is 323 metres above sea level. The highest point in both the Netherlands proper and the Kingdom of the Netherlands is Mount Scenery, on the Caribbean island of Saba, at 887 metres.
The Netherlands is a small flat country; about 300 kilometers from north to south, and about 170 kilometers from east to west. It has an oceanic climate ("Cfb" in the Köppen climate classification).
The Netherlands is a small country, but many people live there. It is one of the most densely populated countries of the world.
Most people in the Netherlands speak Dutch. In Friesland, about 200,000 people speak Frisian. Frisian is the language with the most similarities to English. Some Dutch people speak dialects. The Saxon dialects spoken in the northeastern part of the Netherlands are somewhat similar to Low German.
According to a survey done in 2006, 25% of the Dutch people are Christian and 3% believe in another organised religion, like Judaism, Islam or Hinduism. Twenty-six percent are 'unbounded spiritual' (have their own beliefs and are not tied to a religion). The other 44% are not religious.
Nederlandse Spoorwegen () or NS is the main passenger railway operator in the Netherlands. The rail infrastructure is maintained by network manager ProRail, which was split from NS in 2003. Freight services, formerly operated by NS Cargo, merged with the DB Schenker group in 2000.
NS runs 4,800 scheduled trains daily. In addition, NS provides international rail services from the Netherlands to other European destinations and carries out concessions on a number of foreign rail markets through its subsidiary Abellio such as Abellio Greater Anglia, Merseyrail and ScotRail.
Arriva is another passenger railway operator in the Netherlands. It is a subsidiary of the German company Deutsche Bahn. Their local headquarters is based at Heerenveen. They have been active since 1998.
Notes
Ukraine
Ukraine (, [ukrajina]) is a country in Eastern Europe. Russia is to the north-east of Ukraine, Belarus is to the north-west, Poland and Slovakia are to the west, Hungary, Romania, Moldova and self-proclaimed Transnistria are to the south-west and the Black Sea is to the south.
Ukraine is a republic.
The capital of Ukraine is Kyiv (). It was a part of the Soviet Union from 1922 until 1991.
The official language of Ukraine is Ukrainian (, [ukrajin’s’ka mova]). In the 2001 census, about 29% of people in Ukraine said that they consider Russian to be their main language. These two East Slavic languages are similar in some ways but different in other ways.
Ukraine is divided into 24 oblasts and one Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
The largest cities in Ukraine are:
The name "Ukraine" (u-krayina) is variously interpreted as "edge" or "borderland", but this was proved false. Language specialists are still searching for the true meaning of the word.
It was first used in reference to a core part of the territory of Kyivan Rus in the 12th century. In English, Ukraine was usually used as "the Ukraine". But after 1991, adding "the" is no longer correct.
Many different tribes lived on the territory of modern Ukraine since pre-historical times. Most historians believe that the Great Steppe at the North of the Black Sea was a homeland of all Indo-European and Indo-Iranian languages. Some believe it was also a birthplace of the whole Caucasian race. Wends, Goths, Huns, Sclaveni, Avars and other tribes and tribal groups fought among themselves, joined unions, terminated and assimilated each other.
By the middle of 4th century AD Antes joined other tribes and established a state under their rule. Their state fell under the pressure of Avars in 602 AD and their name was longer mentioned. Since the 7th century over 10 tribal groups joined under the name "Slavs" and made their own state named Rus. The chronicles mention three centers which formed this state: Kuyavia (Kyiv land with Kyiv itself), Slavia (Novgorod land) and Artania (exact location unknown).
Historians still argue about whether Kyiv was founded by Slavs themselves, or they just captured the Khazar fortress which was located on the bank of the Dnieper river, but since the 10th century, it became the capital of the largest and most powerful state in Europe.
Kyivan Rus, is the medieval state of Eastern Slavs. Established by the Slavic with the help of the Varangian squads whose force was used to integrate separate tribes and their lands into one powerful state. Varangian princes, who ruled Rus from its first years were gradually assimilated by natives, but the dynasty started by semy-legendary Ririk survived and continued to govern their separate principalities even after the collapse of Rus.
At an early stage of its existence Rus destroyed such powerful states as the Khazar Khaganate and Old Great Bulgaria. Rus princes successfully fought against the Byzantine Empire, whose emperors had to pay tribute to them. Rus' finally disintegrated into separate principalities.
In the reign of Volodymyr the Great (980-1015) the Kyivan State almost finished its expansion. It occupied the territory from Peipus, Ladoga and Onega lakes in the north to the river Don, Ros, Sula, Southern Bug in the south, from the Dniester, the Carpathians, the Neman, Western Dvina River in the west to the Volga and the Oka River in the east, its area became about 800,000 km. Although some of his predecessors already accepted Christianity for themselves, Vladimir decided to convert the entire population of the state to the new religion. Partially with the help of Byzantine missionaries preachers, partly by the brutal violence, he finally made all Kyiv population to be baptized. For this action, the Ukrainian, and later the Russian Orthodox Churches canonized him under the name of Vladimir the Baptist.
During the reign of Yaroslav the Wise, (1019–1054), Rus reached the zenith of its cultural development and military power. Rus raised the prestige of Eastern Slavs in Europe, improved the international significance of Kyiv. Rus influenced the political relations in all of Europe, Western Asia, and in the Middle East. Kyivan princes supported the political, economic, dynastic relations with France, Sweden, England, Poland, Hungary, Norway, Byzantium.
The Rus state also ruled non-Slavic people (Finno-Ugric population of the North, Turkic of the East and South, Balts of the West etc.). Those people gradually assimilated with the Slavs, and with each other, establishing a framework for the future emergence of three new Eastern-Slavic peoples.
The Kyivan State was an eastern outpost of European Christendom, it kept the movement of nomad hordes to the West, and reduced their onslaught against Byzantium and Central European countries.
After the death of Mstyslav Volodymyrovych (1132), Rus lost its political unity and finally was divided into 15 principalities and lands. Among them Kyiv, Chernygiv, Volodymyr-Suzdal, Novgorod, Smolensk, Polotsk, and Halycian lands and principalities were most large and powerful.
Major political conditions of fragmentation were: