Manmade hills to dwell on. Often considered typical Frisian, but they are not. Only think of the Kincaid Mounds of the Mississippian People living along the rivers Cumberland and, of course, Mississippi in America. Or the lomas ‘hills’ deep in the district of Beni in Bolivia, used to live and grow crops on above the floodwater in the Amazon jungle. Lastly, the chinampas, artificial ‘floating gardens’ of the Aztec people in Central America. You could say, in a watery environment without natural elevations, people frequently erected platforms to dwell and/or grow crops on in order to make full use of the fertile soil. Whether this environment is a river flood plain, bayou, swamp forest, lake, river delta, or tidal marshland. No Einsteins or other brainiacs needed in human history to come up with this mound-to-live-on idea. In this blog post we dive into the different types of mounds you can find when hiking the Frisia Coast Trail. Between the southernmost terp Leffinge-Oude Werf in Flanders and the northernmost terp Misthusum in Jutland.
Definition & Varieties
A terp is an earthwork. A man-made raised mound with the purpose of dwelling on. Protecting buildings, livestock and food stocks from inundation. A sanctuary in a potentially dangerous environment. In addition, these earthworks may or may not have been combined with the growing of crops. An elevated acre. So, double-purpose terps. Whether that is on tidal marshlands bordering the sea, on peatlands adjacent to those marshlands, or along rivers and at river mouths. Exactly the habitats of wider historic Frisia stretching from Flanders to Jutland along the southern North Sea. Roughly 700 kilometers of coastal environment. Terps can be a mound to support a single house, often called a platform, or a mound to support a small settlement of a few hundred people.
dobbe / dob / fehting / feeting / feith - On the salt marshes you can find manmade ponds filled with collected rainwater so the livestock has the possession of fresh water in this otherwise salty environment. These ponds, called a dobbe, can be dug in a terp or created by making a circular dyke on the marshes in which the rainwater is collected. Looks a bit like a big green (grass) donut, with the donut hole filled with rainwater. Besides providing sheep and cattle with fresh water, dobbes, fehtings, etc. also serve as refuge for these animals during storm floods. Go to the extensive salt marshes of 't Noarderleech in the province of Friesland, north to the village of Hallum, where you can find many of these donut earthworks still.
Since this is a hiking site, you can make a short circular hike on 't Noarderleech called Paardendobbenroute 'horses dobbes route' of 7 kilometers. Check the site of It Fryske Gea; the association for nature conservation in the province of Friesland. Know that the soil of this region is very suitable for breeding strong strong horses.
dobbes on the tidal marshland by Joost van Houdt
Hence, besides terps built on tidal marshland -which we will call ‘saltwater terps’ hereafter- this definition also includes the hundreds of terps found in the peatlands of the modern province of Noord Holland, especially in the region of Waterland, and also the town-terps of settlements like Monnickendam and Amsterdam. These terps, part of river and peatland landscapes, existed in the thousands in the Netherlands (Besteman et al 1992). We will call this terp type in a predominantly freshwater environment ‘freshwater terps’. Although saltwater terps have won the world beauty pageant and it is these earthworks we usually think of when talking about terps, it is good to mark here they are only a subset. An iconic one, admittedly.
For an overview of the saltwater terps along the Wadden Sea coast of Germany and the Netherlands, check the website Wierden en Terpen. Check also our trail map, which also indicates terp sites, including in the region of Flanders, the western coast of the Netherlands (Zeeland and Holland), and the southwest of the region of Jutland.
Freshwater terps in (former) peatland were mainly house platforms. Furthermore, terps in peat landscapes have all become invisible to the eye. The reason for this is that peat behaves like water. It flows too, only in slow motion. Over centuries, it levels with its surroundings. Saltwater terps on the tidal marshlands, which are made of clay, together with cow dung and shells, remain visible much longer, albeit clay also behaves like water in the end too. This time, only in super slow motion.
Besides freshwater terps on peatland soil, there are many hundreds of freshwater terps in the river area of the Central Netherlands. This is especially the region of Batavia, or Betuwe in the Dutch language. This area only became embanked with dykes from around the year 1000 onward. Toponyms like pol, heuvel, hof, werf and woerd might refer to these (former) earthworks, either to dwell on or for refuge during river flooding. The latter toponym woerd might also refer to an elevated acre. Of all these terps, about 580 are dwelling mounds, of which the majority are located on riverbanks, and elevated with clay and sods (Eijgenraam et al 2022).
To complicate things even further, the distinction between fresh- and saltwater was, in practice, often fluid. Furthermore, when the high-dyke building began at the end of the first millennium, and the sea was blocked from the land altogether, it was still useful to erect a platform for farmsteads, especially in the lower parts of the land. During the wet seasons of the year, excessive rain and river water could not be discharged into the sea adequately yet, causing the level of the basin to rise and resulting in flooded land by freshwater (Blumenberg 2002), 'contrary land' as characterized by Mapes Dodge (1865). This seasonal inundation could last for months and is beautifully described by writer Hylke Speerstra in his novel De Oerpolder (2006). A nineteenth-century story that takes place in the polder called it Heidenskip, an isolated waterland in the southwest of the province of Friesland. From his book, the following citation:
“Herfst 1824. ‘De regen gestadig aanhoudende en de bijkomende harde winden in November en December maakten dat alles spoedig onder water geraakte zoo dat de meeste boeren hunne polders geheel onder water hadden. Men vreesde al gestadig voor onze Vriesche Zeedijken, dog dij hielden het uit” (De Dagboeken van Lieuwe Janszoon de Jong)
“Autumn 1824. ‘The steady persistent rain and the additional strong winds in November and December made that everything became inundated so that most of the farmers had their polders covered with water. People increasingly feared for our Frisian Sea-dykes, however, these endured” (The Diaries of Lieuwe Janszoon de Jong)
So, water coming in from all sides. Horizontally and vertically. Sea, river and sky. Fresh and salt. Frozen or fluid. Either you are a delta at the North Sea coast or not.
Terps on Kampereiland 'Kampen island' in the delta of the River IJssel near the town of Kampen belong to this fluid category - located in a brackish landscape. This only changed after the Zuiderzee ‘southern sea’ was sealed off in the ’30s of the twentieth century with the construction of the 30-kilometers-long Afsluitdijk 'enclosure dyke', after which the Zuiderzee slowly turned into a giant freshwater lake, now called IJsselmeer or Lake IJssel. Kampereiland’s rich soil is a mixture of sea and river clay. In the year 1364, the town of Kampen received rights over fourteen islands in the river delta which later would compose Kampereiland. The earliest mention of the terps on Kampereiland dates from the fifteenth century, the moment when the islands became inhabited (Nijlunsing 2016, Molema 2018).
A terp on Kampereiland is locally known as a belt or huisbelt ‘house heap/dump’ or a pol ‘clump’, and is on average 2 to 3 meters above mean sea level. The oldest terps in this delta can be found on the riverbanks (Eilander & Heijink 1990). There are about a hundred farmyards on Kampereiland, most of which are built on a huisbelt (Molema 2018). Find them, for example, along Frieseweg ‘Frisian road’. Also, be sure to visit the local history museum ‘Ons Erf’ where a farmstead preserved in its original state, including barns and haystacks, can be visited.
Saltwater terps, as said, are considered the iconic subset of terps, and can be found in relatively large numbers, especially along the Wadden Sea coastal zone of Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands. As well as along the coast of northwest Flanders in Belgium, when this area, together with the province of Zeeland, was still a tidal landscape very comparable to that of the Wadden Sea.
The oldest terps can be found in the territory of the Westergo in the province of Friesland, dating to 600 BC. From here, terps spread eastward along the coast into northern Germany. In fact, all former tidal marshlands along the Wadden Sea became sprinkled with these manmade mounds. From west to east, these are the marshlands of Friesland (NLD), Groningen, Ostfriesland, Friesland (GER) Jeverland, Butjadingen and Stadland, Land Wursten, Land Hadeln, the Wesermarsh, Dithmarschen, Nordfriesland, and Jutland.
The northernmost saltwater terp is that of the (former) hamlet of Misthusum in the southwest of the region of Jutland in the south of Denmark, opposite the Wadden Sea island of Rømø. It regrettably has been abandoned in the year 1814, when the last dweller thought it was the end of history and left. The southernmost terp along the North Sea coast is called Oude Werf, just east of the village of Leffinge in the region of Flanders in the west of Belgium (see further below). Hence the title of this blog post: Between Leffinge and Misthusum.
Because people lived on terps on tidal marshlands and no high dykes existed yet, the sea could flow out over a vast area of marshland during springtides and storm floods. Saltwater terps were on average not much higher than +4 MOD (compare Kampereiland). Higher was simply not necessary and thus not worth the effort. Moving wet clay is heavy work. The sea just flowed out during spring tides or storms without, in general, causing damage to houses, people, crops, and livestock because of this enormous storage capacity. It could breathe, as it were. Reckon about fifty times per year.
An iconic terp (remnant) we must place in the spotlight is the one at the hamlet of Hogebeintum in the province of Friesland. It is the highest terp of all, namely almost +9 MOD. Why the people of Hogebeintum built such a high terp in the Early Middle Ages when +4 MOD was already enough, we do not know. Was it perhaps to show off? “Look at us having a big terp!” Like driving a Porsche Panamera. Or, was it for religious, Babylonian-like reasons? Or were the villagers very anxious and traumatized people after a serious storm flood had caused many casualties? Afraid of the rising waters and not enough psychiatric help available to treat the people's traumata? Or did they simply have too much spare time to kill?
More famous saltwater terps are those of Fallward and Feddersen in Landkreis Cuxhaven and of Ezinge in the province of Groningen. The latter is also nicknamed ‘Pompeii of the North’ because of the magnificent archaeological excavations before the Second World War (Nieuwhof 2020). Large-scale excavations have provided unique insights into the marshland culture from the Iron Age until the Early Middle Ages.
Other former saltwater terps can be found elsewhere too, i.e. not along the present-day Wadden Sea coast. For example, more to the south in the region of Westfriesland in the province of Noord Holland, there are two clusters with each about thirty terps (Borger 2021). One cluster is in and around the town of Schagen, including the terps of Avendorp, and Hemkewerf. The other cluster of terps is located around the villages of Eenigenburg and Warmenhuizen. The terps of the region of Westfriesland can be grouped under those along the current Wadden Sea coast, since the Wadden Sea coast used to extend up to this area until the great land reclamations of the north of the province of Noord Holland before the Second World War.
Underneath the marine town of Den Helder in the upper north of the province of Noord Holland also lay an old saltwater terp. It was named 't Torp meaning ‘the village’. Actually, it was the terp of the former medieval settlement of Edesthorpa. Located near natural park and museum De Nollen, where once a small island was, and near the current neighbourhood De Schooten. According to an early-medieval charter settlement Edesthopra had three feudal farmsteads. The name Edesthorpa possibly means 'village' at watercourse' (Minneboo 2017). Sadly, terp 't Torp was excavated in the '60s of the twentieth century (Van Berkel 2017).
On the (former) islands of Marken, Schokland and Urk at the former Zuiderzee, you can find terps too. These (former) islands were, in fact, Hallig-islands, as you can still find them in the region of Nordfriesland in Germany (see further below). They are islands of clay on peat soil, and are residues of former tidal marshlands. On the island of Marken, there are still fifteen of the once twenty-seven terps, locally known as werven, to be seen. For example, Wittewerf, Kerkbuurt, Remmitswerf, Kets, Moeniswerf, Grotewerf, Altena and Rozewerf. Drowned werven are Kraaienwerf, Thamiswerf and Houtemanswerf. Three terps were lost to the sea between 1720 and 1775 (Aarsen et al 2000, Rijkswaterstaat 2024). If one ignores the two-kilometers-long Zeedijk Rd. connecting the island with the mainland of the province of Noord-Holland, Marken still is a Hallig-island, albeit surrounded by a lake instead of a sea in the meantime. The former island of Schokland consisted of three terps, namely Emmeloord, Middelbuurt and Zuidert. The islands of Schokland and Urk are now part of the embanked land called Noordoostpolder of the province of Flevoland.
Further south, in the province of Zuid Holland on the island of Hoeksche Waard more terps can be found near the village of Strijen. A terp on the island of Hoeksche Waard is known as a hil or hille. Compare the village of Piershil (Bank & Bosscher 2021), and at the village of Maasdam remains of a hille have been found. The old landscape of the island of Hoeksche Waard is very comparable to that of the island of Kampereiland, only the terps are called (huis)belten. Not only on the island of Hoeksche Waard, but also on the former island of Walcheren in the province of Zeeland the word hil can be found to indicate an elevation, namely the dune called Hoge Hil. Of course, the Dutch word hille and the English word hill are one and the same. With the island of Hoeksche Waard facing England right across the Southern Bight, this is not surprisingly.
Even further to the south, in the region of Flanders, one can find former saltwater terps at the villages of Leffinge, Bredene, and Oude Werf near Leffinge. As mentioned, Leffinge-Oude Werf, meaning 'old terp', is the southernmost terp of the North Sea coast as well. Other terps in the Zwin area in the region of Flanders are suspected to be at Knokke, Koudekerke, Oostkerke, Ramskapelle, and Westkapelle. Additionally, the toponyms Lockwierde, Houtwerf, Outvaarts Werf, Bogaerts Werf, Zuidwerf, Stekels Werf, Boenzacs Werf, Blevins Werf, Barezeles Werf, Molenwerf, Monnikewerve, Wallewerve, Weerdenwal, and many more might all refer to the (former) presence of earthworks. Much archaeological research still needs to be done in the region of western Flanders, including in the Zwin area. Check also our blog post A Frontier known as Watery Mess: the Coast of Flanders to find more information about the early-medieval Flemish-Frisian terp habitation in this region.
The last of the Mohicans
Although most saltwater terps have lost their protective function after land had been secured by big-dyke building from around the start of the second millennium, there’s one big exception, namely those in Landkreis Nordfriesland. Here, one can still witness people living on terps within the full dynamics of the sea, unprotected by high dykes. These are the so-called Hallig-islands mentioned earlier, which are saltmarsh islands with one or a few terps on them. The soil they are built on is clay on peat, a fragile composition once peat gets exposed to the grasp of the sea. Hallig-terps, sometimes supporting only one farm or house, sometimes supporting a tiny village. For more information about the Hallig-islands, read also our blog post How a town drowned overnight. The case of Rungholt.
Recently (2021), after a thousand years, the terps on the Hallig-islands of Nordfriesland have been raised once again. To brace themselves for climate change, global warming, and rising sea levels. Moreover, the islanders are trying to stimulate the sedimentation of clay with low dykes and breakwaters of stone, attempting to let the Hallig-islands rise parallel to the rise of the sea. As they say in Nordfriesland: "Mit jedem Sturm wächst die Insel" ('with every storm the island grows').
We love the terp names on the Hallig-islands. To name most of them: Bandixwarf, Hanswarft, Honkenswarf, Ipkenswarft, Knudtswarft, Lorenzwarft, Mayenswarf, Ockelützwarft, Ockenswarft, Tammwarft, and Volkertswarft. Not too different from terp names on the island of Marken mentioned earlier.
Note that when you are in Nordfriesland, be mindful when talking about Halligs. Saying to a North Frisian that a Hallig is an island is inconsiderate. He or she will correct you in a grumpy voice and say it is not an island. Then he or she will probably say “moin” to you and walk or swim, depending on the tide, away. They are right in that Hallig-islands used to be part of a vast saltmarsh area, which largely was lost to the sea in the course of the High Middle Ages. Too fresh in the memory in the psyche of the Nordfriesen to be forgotten, if ever. Admitting it is an island would be admitting your defeat against your eternal enemy and benefactor, which took so much fertile land, livestock, and especially so many lives in the past.
A former Hallig is that of Dagebüll, today a municipality of the mainland of the region of Nordfriesland. You can find quite many terps here, like Bahnenswarft, Borderswarft, Gabrielswarft, Nordwarft and Tudenswarft.
Terps, a current solution
In 1930, when the Wieringermeer Polder was created in the northeast of the province of Noord Holland, a huge terp was also made, four hectares big, next to the newly founded village of Wieringerwerf. It even became of service in 1945 when the dyke surrounding the polder was destroyed, and the polder became inundated. Go to our blog post Refuge on a terp 2.0. Waiting to be liberated for more about what happened there and at the end of the war.
In 2015, another eight brand new terps were erected, each 6 meters high. This time, freshwater terps in the Central Netherlands in the Overdiepse Polder of the province of Noord Brabant (Quekel 2015). The terpenplan ‘mound plan’, as it was called, was a private initiative of local farmers and became part of the plans of the national government to give the River Meuse a broader riverbed again to prevent dyke breaches and subsequent flooding. This followed the critical situations in the years 1993 and 1995.
Recently (2019), the federation Broek Polder reconstructed the so-called Rottahuis ‘Rotta house’ (viz. the River Rotta) with a platform dating to the year 1015 in the town of Vlaardingen in the province of Zuid Holland, then still called West Frisia. It illustrates how the Frisians lived in the river delta of the River Meuse. Go visit it, now part of the interesting experimental archaeological site Masamuda.
So, we are happy to see that terp building is a 2600-years-old tradition still alive along the southern North Sea coast. But to the take the safety instructions and warnings very serious when building a terp. Therefore use our DIY manual Making a Terp in only 12 Steps.
Statistics & Money
When talking about numbers, the estimation is that about 500 terps existed on the (former) tidal marshlands of the province of Friesland (Besteman et al 1992). House platforms have been left outside this number. Numbers vary too. During a stocktake in 1905, including house platforms, the number of terps amounted to 574 in the province of Friesland, and in 1944 the number amounted to 910. The most recent (2020) numbers are that in the province of Friesland 955 terps have been identified of which 679 have been partially or completely leveled, and in the province of Groningen 587 of which 268 have been partially or completely leveled. However, still new terps are being discovered in the landscape. The total original number of saltwater terps in the north of the Netherlands, both terps proper and house platforms, is estimated to be almost 2,500 (Nieuwhof 2020). So, just wait and over time the number of terps will rise.
If we want to be more precise, we should talk about ‘terp remains’ instead of terps since nearly all terps have been commercially exploited, excavated and levelled. The terps one can still see in the provinces of Friesland and Groningen, are mostly the remains of once much more impressive terps, or those which are fully covered with houses, farmsteads and a church, and thanks to this escaped commercial quarrying.
Around the year 1900, terps in the northern Netherlands, and less so in the region of Ostfriesland in Germany, were being excavated massively for commercial purposes. The rich terp soil, the terra preta of the Low Countries, was sold as fertilization for poorer soils, such as the sandy soils in the province of Drenthe. Terp soil was sold at 70 cents (guilders) per tonne in 1890, which was a lot of money back then. In 1920, terp soil even cost 110 cents per tonne. In the ’40s, commercial quarrying of terp soil stopped. Not because the Second World War started, but simply because not many terps were left to be commercially exploited. A positive side effect was that because of these massive excavations, many historic artifacts were found. At the same time, much archaeological data, especially the provenance of the artifacts, has been lost, and small artifacts are scattered all over the country, depending on where the terp soil was dispersed as fertilizer. Wooden artifacts that went unnoticed probably did not survive this reckless treatment as fertilizer.
What’s in the Name
Notice that we used the word terp as used in the province of Friesland -and recently in the province of Noord Brabant too. People in the province of Noord Holland, however, mostly use the word werf. In the province of Zeeland and the region of Flanders the word werve is being used, although the toponym wi(e)rde or weerde and stelle also exist. The word werve in the province of Zeeland mainly because people there prefer to put the letter e behind every single word they pronounce. In the province of Groningen the word wierde is always being used. Official German is Wurt but the Nordfriesen use mainly warf and warft. The Rüstringer Friesen in the Lower River Weser area use Warden as most of the villages have this as a suffix. Frisere ‘Frisians’ in the very southwest of the region of Jutland use the words værft or varft.
The Old-Frisian word hwarf and the current word werf, and all the variants aforementioned, indicate a mound or a landing. Werf and warft would, therefore, be more appropriate terms for a dwelling mound than the internationally adopted word terp. Do not tell this to the Frisians in the province of Friesland! The word terp derives from þurpa in the proto-Germanic language, meaning house or farmstead (Kuipers, Jensma & Vries 2011) and is related to torp (Danish language), doarp (Mid-Frisian language) or dorp (Dutch language) which means village. It is terp and not warft, wierde, etc. that found its way into the English and Flemish languages. Therefore, we settle the discussion this way. Majority always rules.
The names, often suffixes, for artificial dwelling mounds we have found: aard, (huis)belt, hille, pol, stelle, terp, uard, uert, varft, værft, vliedberg, warf, warft, ward, warden, weer, wehr, werd, werf, werve, wier, wierde, wird, woerd, wö(h)rden, wort(h), würd(e), and wurt(h). For an overview, check the atlas ‘De Bosatlas van de Wadden‘ (2018). The word vliedberg can either donate a mound for cattle the flee to during floods, a remnant of motte-and-bailey castle, or a terp proper. Taking this whole history into account, the newly founded town of Wieringerwerf is a combination of wier and werf, in other words a tautology. To blend everything even more, the town of Wieringerwerf also has a street name called Terpstraat 'terp street.' Wier, werf, terp - something for everyone. Not for nothing it is a village in the polder.
Note 1 – Ever planning to erect a terp yourself, find here our DIY manual Making a Terp in only 12 Steps.
Note 2 - In the lead of this blog post, we made a comparison with the Native American cultures. Earlier, we found another striking parallel concerning the use of land, namely the terra preta 'black soil'. This is particularly evident between the Drenth Plateau and the Amazon. The technique of the terra preta dates back to 1000 BC and is about how to fertilize the soil. Be in awe reading our blog post The Killing Fields - of the Celts.
Note 3 – featured image Langeness.de
Suggested hiking
The Ancient Mound Trail, following 39 earthworks and mounds. Check for more the trail guide Indian Mounds of Northeast Louisiana (2008).
Suggested music
The Cult, She Sells Sanctuary (1985)
Further reading
Aarsen, A., Dingemans, M. & Kooiman, M.A., Cultuurhistorische verkenningen. Marken (2000)
Bank, J. & Bosscher, D., Omringd door water. De geschiedenis van de 25 Nederlandse eilanden (2021)
Berkel, van G., Over de plaatsbepaling van de toponiemen in het Cartularium van Radbod (2017)
Besteman, J.C., Bos, J.M. & Heidinga, H.A., Graven naar Friese koningen. De opgravingen in Wijnaldum (1992)
Betten, E., Terpen- en wierdenland (2018)
Blumenberg, A., Butjadingen – Land und Leute – gestern und heute (2002)
Borger, G.J., De Zijpe en de Zuiderzee (2021)
Chen, A., 1,000 Years Ago, Corn Made This Society Big. Then, A Changing Climate Destroyed It (2017)
Christiansen, K., Prehistoric Pilgrimage. A journey down the Louisiana Ancient Mounds Trail (2022)
Cultuurland Advies, Landschapsbiografie van de Hoeksche Waard (2024)
Deckers, P., Ervynck, A. & Tys, D., De vroegmiddeleeuwse bewoning van de kustvlakte: de terp site Leffinge-Oude Werf (2012)
Dijkstra, M.F.P, Rondom de mondingen van Rijn en Maas. Landschap en bewoning tussen de 3e en 9e eeuw in Zuid-Holland, in het bijzonder de Oude Rijnstreek (2011)
Doorn, van F., De Friezen. Een geschiedenis (2021)
Eijgenraam, G., Beek, van R. & Candel, J., Hoog en droog naast de rivier. De archeologische rijkdom van woonheuvels in de Betuwe (2022)
Eilander, D.A. & Heijink, W., Bodemkaart van Nederland. Toelichting bij de kaartbladen 20 West Lelystad (gedeeltelijk), 20 Oost Lelystad en 21 West Zwolle (1990)
Ervynck, A., Deckers, P., Lentacker, A., Tys, D. & Neer, van M., ‘Leffinge-Oude Werf’: the first archaeozoological collection from a terp settlement in coastal Flanders (2012)
Everdingen, van J., Droogte maakt contouren van middeleeuws terpdorp bij Strijen zichtbaar: ‘Dit is van groot belang’ (2022)
Halbertsma, H., Terpen tussen Vlie en Eems. Een geografisch-historische benadering (1963)
Hofstede, J., Küstenschutz in Schleswig-Holstein: ein Überblick über Strategien und Maßnahmen (2019)
Knol, E., Friese terpen doorgesneden (2023)
Knol, E., Hogebeintum aan snee (2019)
Knol, E., et al, The medieval cemetery of Oosterbeintum (Friesland) (1996)
Kuipers, J.J.B., Jensma, G. & Vries, O., Nederland in de Middeleeuwen. De canon van ons middeleeuws verleden (2011)
Maijer, M., IJsseldelta bij Kampen (2021)
Mann, C.C., Earthmovers of the Amazon (2000)
Mapes Dodge, M.E., Hans Brinker; or, the Silver Skates: A Story of Life in Holland (1865)
Meier, D., Ausgrabung: Hundorf (website)
Meier, D., Die Halligen. In Vergangenheit und Gegenwart (2020)
Minneboo, K., Helders historie door de eeuwen heen (2017)
Molema, M.M.L., Buurmans gras is altijd groener. Een interdisciplinair onderzoek naar de landschapskenmerken, bezitsverhoudingen en gebruiksgeschiedenis van hooilanden in de IJsseldelta tijdens de 19e en 20e eeuw (2018)
Netherlands Water Partnership, Restored to full glory: dwelling mounds for flood protection (2015)
Nicolay, J. & Langen, de G. (eds.), Friese terpen in doorsnede. Landschap, bewoning en exploitatie. Deel I: het onderzoek in woord en beeld (2023)
Nicolay, J. & Langen, de G. (eds.), Friese terpen in doorsnede. Landschap, bewoning en exploitatie. Deel II: profiel- en vlaktekeningen (2023)
Nicolay, J. & Langen, de G. (eds.), Graven aan de voet van de Achlumer dorpsterp (2015)
Nieuwhof, A., 650 Terpen langs de Noordzee (2018)
Nieuwhof, A., Eight human skulls in a dung heap and more. Ritual practice in the terp region of northern Netherlands 600 BC-AD 300 (2015)
Nieuwhof, A., De lege vierde eeuw (2016)
Nieuwhof, A., Ezinge Revisited. The Ancient Roots of a Terp Settlement. Volume 1: Excavation – Environment and Economy – Catalogue of Plans and Finds (2020)
Nieuwhof, A., Scherven brengen geluk. Aanwijzingen voor opzettelijk gebroken aardewerk (2018)
Nieuwhof, A., Bakker, M., Knol, E., Langen, de G.J., Nicolay, J.A.W., Postma, D., Schepers, M., Varwijk, T.W., Vos, P.C., Adapting to the sea: Human habitation in the coastal area of the northern Netherlands before medieval dike building (2019)
Nijlunsing, W., Kamper munten in muntvondst Kampen 2010 (2016)
Oosthuizen, S., The emergence of the English (2019)
Popta, van Y. & Aaldersberg, G., Onbekend, maar niet onbemind: terpen en terponderzoek in de Noordoostpolder (2016)
Quekel, S., Comeback van de terp in Waspik: oude methode voor bescherming tegen hoogwater (2015)
Remkes, J., Wat wel kan: uit de impasse en een aanzet voor perspectief (2022)
Renswoude, van O., De Huigen en het Humsterland (2022)
Renswoude, van O., Leeuwarden en andere warden (2022)
Rijkswaterstaat, Dijkversterking Marken: archeologische vondst (2024)
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