Eindhoven

Eindhoven (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈɛi̯ntɦoːvə(n)]) is a municipality and a city located in the province of North Brabant in the south of the Netherlands, originally at the confluence of the Dommel and Gender streams. The Gender was dammed short of the city centre in the 1950s but the Dommel still runs through the city. The city has a population of 223,220 in January 2015, making it the fifth-largest municipality of the Netherlands and the largest of North Brabant.

Neighbouring cities and towns include Son en Breugel, Nuenen, Geldrop-Mierlo, Heeze-Leende, Waalre, Veldhoven, Eersel, Oirschot and Best. The agglomeration has a population of 337,487. The metropolitan area consists of 419,045 inhabitants. The city region has a population of 753,426. Also, Eindhoven is located in the Brabantse Stedenrij, a combined metropolitan area with about 2 million inhabitants.

Name

The name Eindhoven derives from the contraction of the regional words eind (meaning last or end) and hove (or hoeve; a section of some 14 hectares of land). "Eind" is toponymically a common prefix and postfix in local place- and streetnames. A "hove" was a parcel of land that might be given in leasehold to private persons such as farmers by the local lord. Taken in conjunction with the fact that a string of such parcels existed around Woensel, the original location of Eindhoven may be understood to be "last hoves on the land of Woensel".

Netherlands

The Netherlands (ⁱ/ˈnɛðərləndz/; Dutch: Nederland [ˈneːdərˌlɑnt]) is the main "constituent country" (Dutch: land) of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a small, densely populated country located in Western Europe with three island territories in the Caribbean. The European part of the Netherlands borders Germany to the east, Belgium to the south, and the North Sea to the northwest, sharing maritime borders with Belgium, the United Kingdom and Germany. The largest and most important cities in the Netherlands are Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam. Amsterdam is the country's capital, while The Hague holds the Dutch seat of government and parliament. The port of Rotterdam is the largest port in Europe – as large as the next three largest combined – and was the world's largest port between 1962 and 2004. The name Holland is also frequently used to informally refer to the whole of the country of the Netherlands.

"Netherlands" literally means "lower countries", influenced by its low land and flat geography, with only about 50% of its land exceeding one metre above sea level. Most of the areas below sea level are man-made. Since the late 16th century, large areas (polders) have been reclaimed from the sea and lakes, amounting to nearly 17% of the country's current land mass.