[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] Free English language book on German villages in Mazovia

[Günther Böhm]

Jerry Frank schrieb:
> It is true that the author, in some sections, acknowledges that Germans 
> and Poles often lived in the Olendry.  There are clues within the book 
> that the author believes not only that every Olendry was originally 
> settled by Dutch from Holland but that most of them retained small 
> pockets of Dutch Mennonite residents up until 1945 (reference chapter on 
> 18th and 20th Century Settlements).
Hello Jerry, Bronwyn and Worth,
I would like to contribute one more detail:
In Germany the word "Holländerei" is regionally still in use. It does 
not mean a special type of rural social organization but a traditional 
method to dewater and fertilize wet and swampy areas. An early 
occurrence of this method was in the "Weichselniederung" east of Danzig 
as part of "Preußen Königlichen Anteils" under Polish rule. A borough of 
Torgelow in northeastern Germany is called "Holländerei" or simply 
"Holl". An originally swampy part of Liebenwalde north of Berlin is 
called "Neuholland". The ameliorated areas were usually used as pasture 
for cattle. This cattle leads to another regional meaning of the word 
"Holländerei". In northern Germany a "Holländerei" is a dairy farm where 
the milk is processed into butter and cheese ( see 
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holl%C3%A4nderei ). Both methods originated 
from the Netherlands but their designation was definitely German.

Why "Holländerei" and "Neuholland" instead of any other name of a North 
German province with flooded and regained land? The "Große Kurfürst" 
Friedrich Wilhelm I. of Brandenburg was educated in the Netherlands 
(like Tzar Peter the Great he learned the shipbuilder's trade) and 
married to Luise Henriette von NASSAU-ORANIEN, the eldest daughter of 
Prince Frederik Hendrik van ORANJE, the stadtholder of Holland, Zeeland, 
Utrecht, Guelders, and Overijssel. The "Große Kurfürst" was the first to 
bring Dutch colonists to his provinces devastated by the Thirty Years 
War and his grandson, the "Soldatenkönig" Friedrich Wilhelm I. the first 
to emeliorate his halfway sandy and halfway swampy home province of 
Brandenburg (especially the swampy "Rhin-Luch") with Dutch plans and 
under Dutch foremen.

Günther