Rotterdam began as a dam on the Rotte and became Europe's top port
Rotterdam is the Netherlands' second-largest city by people and largest by area at about 319 square kilometres, sitting in South Holland on the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta via the New Meuse. A dam on the Rotte in 1270 started it; city rights came from William IV of Holland in 1340.
The Rotterdam–The Hague metro area of about 2.7 million is the EU's tenth-largest and the Dutch densest. Europe's largest seaport anchors logistics; in 2022 the city counted 655,468 residents and over 180 nationalities.
A settlement stood at the lower end of the Rotte, whose name means muddy water, by at least 950, and floods around 1150 prompted dikes such as Schieland's High Sea Dike. Around 1350 the Rotterdamse Schie canal opened routes to northern towns, making it a trans-shipment point between the Netherlands, England and Germany. From the 1600s its merchants pioneered the Dutch slave trade, which lasted until 1814, and the city hosted chambers of both the Dutch East and West India companies; by the 1670s about 30,000 people lived there.
Its biggest boom followed the Nieuwe Waterweg in 1872, and the 1898 Witte Huis was briefly Europe's tallest office building. Neutral in World War I, it became the world's largest spy centre, with MI6's main European office on de Boompjes. On 14 May 1940 the Luftwaffe almost wiped out the centre, and the Dutch surrendered the next day. Rebuilding produced the Lijnbaan in 1953, Europe's first car-free shopping street, and later towers by Rem Koolhaas, Piet Blom and Ben van Berkel.
Queen Wilhelmina gave the city the motto Sterker door strijd, stronger through effort, in 1948. Rail, road and river links reaching the Ruhr earn it the nickname Gateway to Europe.
Source: Rotterdam
