Place · region

Beemster

1612 · 17th century · Also known as Beemster Polder

The Beemster is a polder in North Holland, north of Amsterdam, created by draining a lake between 1609 and 1612 with dozens of windmills under the direction of Jan Leeghwater, with money from Amsterdam merchants. Its fields, roads and canals were laid out in a regular grid that became a model of Dutch land reclamation. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1999.

Beemster
Image: Arch · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

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Dutch RepublicSocioeconomy

See also

Cite this entry
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Beemster. In The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/beemster
MLA
“Beemster.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/beemster. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Beemster.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/beemster.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Beemster’, The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/beemster (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random entry ↻