 This presentation is also on behalf of my colleague Jan Duisburg. I will discuss the Topic Castle Landscapes in the Netherlands... ...and from an archaeological or more management perspective. First, I will give a short overview of castle sites in the Netherlands in general. Then I will talk about castle sites and their surroundings... ...and I will end with castle and heritage management... ...more the daily practice. The overview of castles in the Netherlands, when we take a look at them... ...it's clear that the political situation determines the construction of the buildings. In the Netherlands, local and regional secular and religious elite... ...are responsible for the most important part. Territorial rules such as urls, dukes and bishops... ...are responsible for a minority of the castles. The eldest castles were built around 1080. Most of them were built for between 1200 and 1400 AD. And the castle building ended around 1550 AD. This is the visible castles and the periods they dated. There's a variety of shapes and sizes... ...ranging from solitary tower houses to large square and round castles with a baile. The eldest castles were timber built after 1200 AD... ...brick and a few cases natural stone were used as main building material. As there are in the Netherlands no mountains... ...and a few hills, the castles were sometimes placed on artificial earthen platforms. Almost all castles are surrounded by one or more moats. Most of them had a defensive and residential function. Only a few had primarily a military function. After the Middle Ages, a large number of the castles were transformed into country houses... ...surrounded by parks, woodlands and arable lands. Forms were also part of it. They became estates. Other castles were torn down. Only the moats remained and are still visible in the landscape. The castles are not evenly spread across the Netherlands. As you can see, most castles are situated in the north, middle and south of the country. There's a clear distinction in the visible and invisible castles sides. The archaeological ones. On the left hand you see the visible ones... ...and on the right hand you see the archaeological ones. Especially in the provinces of Groningen, up to the north... ...in Zeeland, to the south-west and in the south... ...to a lesser degree there are concentrations of archaeological castles sides... ...which are nowadays hardly visible in the landscape. In the northern part, the dense distribution is due to the political situation. It lacks a central government and the society can be characterized as a Freud society. The local elite families fought each other. Most castles in this area were relatively small brick tower houses and tower keeps. Some were placed on artificial mounds. Castles are situated on stream bridges or in or near villages. Often several houses lay close to each other. Most of them, however, were torn down after the Middle Ages. The transformation into a country house rarely exists in this area. As you can see on the right side there are all archaeological sites. One example is this one. It looks beautiful, but only the tower building remains. The rest is old. It's a farmhouse from the 19th century. The rest is all archaeological things that remain. I show a lot of pictures from castles sides in the Netherlands. Most cases on the other side you see the location. On the right hand, in the grave, that's the protected area of the site. As you can see, this presentation has only a small part that's protected as a monument. Then we go to the thousands of the Netherlands. The distribution is linked also to the political situation. Almost every village castles were built. Of which a large number still exists, some conduct or transformed into a country house. Others became ruins. The castles were built by local, original, elite families. In the south you see larger, mostly rectangular brick or stone castles with a bay. The site location is very rural. Some are located near rivers or streams, like the Merse and other on higher locations in the landscape, on prominent places. Due to the natural, hilly landscape in the very south, artificial mountains are a minority. One example is Falkenbüller, and I will come back to this site later on. In the middle of the country, the Central River area, we find several clusters of castles, castle sites and estates. This concentration is most caused by the political development of the area as well as the reclamation, so-called copis, that were carried out here in the 13th century. The castles were built here predominantly by members of elite groups, both secular and ecclesiastical, who participated in the reclamation. Furthermore, this area was in the Middle Ages, the border area between the country of Holland and the secular part of the visual pre of Utrecht. Apart from reclamation reasons, rivers formed attractive settlement locations. In this area, we see castles near villages and towns, as well as groups of castles in reclamation areas. This is one example of a very nicely preserved castle. The motor site was being dated from the late 13th century. Then I come to the second part. Castles influenced the development of their surrounding landscapes, leading in some cases to castle or elite landscapes. The Dutch castles we know are connected with settlements. Some of the settlements rose near the castles. In Dutch, the toponym, stein or stein, indicates a connection, so does not appear to be an account for the burg toponym. A few examples are... Oh, sorry. Eiselstein, as you see here. The castle and the village nearby. That's left is the tower. From the 14th century onwards, castles were built in existing villages and towns. The reasons differ, for instance, to control cities or to achieve a city-state. Another example of a castle built in a town is Utrecht. Utrecht, in the middle of the country. Here, another stream was demolished to build the castle. What remains of the castle nowadays? Someone visits Utrecht by train or by car. In the parking lot, you find the ways of the castle. And it's even not on the spot where it's found, so it's executed. Another example is the... In the middle of the country, we can find castles connected to the reclamation. An example is the Langdok Reetring, which can be found of a leaf of castle landscape. On the top, all the dots are castles. You see there's a reclamation X, and this is one of those castles left. And you see also the influence of the environment. This is the road. It's the road. It's classified as a little church, so this is a pretty intact landscape still left. I'll show a few examples of castles. What they have in common is that we know a little about the immediate surroundings. Associated gardens, parks, deer parks, ponds, farms, and the impact of castles on the landscape. Therefore, we cannot compare the death situation. For instance, the British or the Irish situation. The lack of research into the relationship between castles, their immediate environment... ...and the landscape can be explained in part by the strong emphasis... ...in Dutch castle research on military and political functions... ...building themselves and the genealogical aspects. There was less attention for the social and economic functioning... ...of the castles in relation to the environment. And this brings us to the third part of the presentation. The heritage management. The consequence of the lack of attention and knowledge about the environment... ...is also visible in the protection measures. Often, only the main castle island is protected as a list of buildings... ...or list monuments at all. If there are no visual remains of the building lift... ...the site can be protected as an archaeological monument. For these monuments, Kansas is saying... ...often the protection is restricted to the main building. Even bays are in the most cases not protected. Only if castles are transformed into estates, so from 1550 A.D. onwards... ...the gardens and parks are often protected. The problem is also that if a castle is protected as a built monument... ...that does not mean that the archaeological remains are protected. Or that they have to do archaeological research if there are development plans. This depends on the policy of the municipality. So the interest in the past for the main building... ...and its history can be seen in the protection regime. Only recently the awareness of the surrounding area is grown. Because archaeological research in the past mainly respected to the moated area... ...now we have a few examples of archaeological research of the gardens and park areas. The reason for the research is often to bring back the old splendor. Archaeological research provides input on the questions... ...of which phase of the landscape must be restored. So historical, geographical and archaeological research... ...is increasingly being conducted to obtain information. To summarize, in general elements such as gardens, parks... ...ponds, farmsteads and surrounding castling systems are often not legally protected. These elements are under pressure. In the Netherlands, you can say space is scarce and they are therefore in high demand. The maintenance of castles and estates becomes more and more expensive... ...and owners often see sale of parts of their property as a solution. So castles that are connected with their environment... ...and original functional contexts are becoming rarer. The influence of castles on the new landscape developments... ...is reduced to historical references. The castles themselves become tourist attractions... ...and are used as venues for parties, weddings and fairs. There is also much interest in castle ruins and sites from municipalities... ...private developers and as a public. Many castles are redeveloped and ruins are consolidated... ...or sometimes some cases castles are rebuilt. So reconnecting castles with the cultural landscape... ...is not yet an issue in the Netherlands. I will give a few examples of developments on archaeological monuments... ...and also on built monuments. This is one of them. It's an archaeological monument. It's a 11th century motor site. There has been an excavation in 1906. And in 2016 you see exactly the same branch with exactly the same features. So it's well preserved. But now, as one of the management's questions, only two weeks ago... ...I got a question from Nature Reserve, who owns the area. They want to look out the ditch because they have gold for nature. So they need some frogs back or something. So they need water and there's a hot climate in the Netherlands... ...in these years. They want to deepen the ditches. So it's an archaeological monument, so we said no, we don't want to... ...to cast there are medieval, fallen logical rest still in that moat. Another example is the Corsal. It's also a castle site. What you see there is only the moat, which is visible in the last year. There's a farmhouse on top of it. Almost 20 years ago, Jonah wants to redevelop it. He wants to build apartment buildings on this area. We are in charge and we said they can build apartments... ...but only under already disturbed parts of this site. So there's a substantial farmhouse and even a very large stable. That's where they can build things. But because of the economic price, everything stopped. Then there was an idea to make a horse riding farm, etc. Nowadays there are new ideas to build apartments. Something is going wrong, like that. This one. This is in the reclamation area. Several moat sites. They are still beautiful. You see the pasturing, which... ...you can't see anything, but during the medieval period and afterwards... ...they are still there. So even nowadays it has some function in the society. They don't change the pattern of the areas. This is also from the reclamation area, as you see. The pressure on the landscape. This is an area where at the moment... ...there are built 35,000 homes in these surroundings. You see it everywhere. But only just a small site of the castle. That's left. The rest will have energy. I have to hurry up. Another example, exactly the same. This one is left because it's in Dutch defense structure... ...from the 18th and 19th century. This is an example where archaeological research... ...was conducted to the gardens. This is one of the good examples. Here you see also the apartment buildings near the castle site. This is the townhouse and the castle. This is also the community that wanted this. This is a local initiative. Here they want to build apartment buildings. The heritage organization, they want to stop it. But this is the idea of the municipality. And this is also... ...the castle is increasing every year. They can build new parts of the castle... ...to use it for weddings and parties. And this was the local initiative. They want to rebuild parts of the castle, this local material. They want to dig that local material, marble or limestone. But they've forgotten that also the limestone... ...is an underneath subsurface landscape. It will be completely destroyed. Where are these? The municipality, they like it very much. Also province like to do it, but then... ...they didn't thought about what would be destroyed. So now organizations are against it. And now the plan is still back to normal. Only this is a good example. They want to remove some buildings built in the past... ...because of the view of the castle. May I say something? My conclusion. Sorry for... Final words. Yeah, the final words. That's true. To conclude, this was not a very cheerful story... ...about the Dutch castles and their surroundings. To see that the awareness of the castle and its influence... ...on the landscape is growing, as we saw in this last example... ...is positive. Combined historical, geographical and archaeological research... ...is necessary to gain more information about castles and their city. Researchers from different disciplines... ...but also heritage management organizations... ...can collaborate more intensively. The results of research and different interests... ...can then be better coordinated. However, the most important thing, in my opinion, is to tell residents... ...and other stakeholders the whole story about castles and its surroundings. Involve them. Only if there is support for the preservation of valuable... ...invisible archaeological remains, landscape elements... ...and local systems, etc., will these be preserved... ...and not only as a historical reference in the naming of a new residential area. Thank you, viewers.