Nor must it be forgotten how largely this building up of the elaborate system of dykes, dams and canals by which this water-logged land was transformed into the Holland of the closing decades of the sixteenth century, enabled her people to offer such obstinate and successful resistance to the mighty power of Philip II.
The earliest dynasty of the Counts of Holland--Dirks, Floris, and Williams--was a very remarkable one.

Not only did it rule for an unusually long period, 922 to 1299, but in this long period without exception all the Counts of Holland were strong and capable rulers.

The fiefs of the first two Dirks lay in what is now known as North Holland, in the district called Kennemerland.

It was Dirk III who seized from the bishops of Utrecht some swampy land amidst the channels forming the mouth of the Meuse, which, from the bush which covered it, was named Holt-land (Holland or Wood-land).

Here he erected, in 1015, a stronghold to collect tolls from passing ships.