Amsterdam is the capital of the Netherlands, although the government as well as most of the national institutions are based in The Hague. Based on the figures for 2017, the municipality of Amsterdam has more than 850,000 inhabitants, called Amstellodamois, which makes it the most populous municipality in the Netherlands. I

t is located in the heart of the Amsterdam region, with around 1,350,000 inhabitants. The urban area, which brings together more than 2,400,000 residents, is itself part of a conurbation called Randstad which has 7,100,000 inhabitants. The city is the largest in North Holland, but is not, however, the capital of the province, the latter being Haarlem, located 19 kilometers west of Amsterdam.

The name of the town comes from the old Dutch name Amstelredamme evoking the origins of the city: the dike (Dam) on the Amstel. Small fishing village in the 12th century, the city experienced very strong growth in the Middle Ages, late compared to other cities in the Netherlands, to the point of becoming one of the main ports in the world during the Dutch Golden Age. .

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