Nowhere does the article mention anything about sea levels, so maybe don't jump to those conclusions. The land itself can also rise or sink, and that is more li

Nowhere does the article mention anything about sea levels, so maybe don't jump to those conclusions. The land itself can also rise or sink, and that is more likely to be the case when it comes to the history of this region. The villages in the Netherlands (and northern Germany, and Denmark) always were already perilously close to being below sea level to begin with. We're talking about a flat former river delta with extremely wet soil. Remove water from it for agricultural activities through drains and pumps and the land sinks. That is why the villages existed on artificial mounds to protect them from floodwaters (known as a "terp"). So villages like these were more likely to be abandoned due to agricultural activities making the land sink so much that they flooded all the time, which would make the villages themselves not worth living in. Tangent: The website linked in your profile suggests that you're Dutch like me. If so, honest question: did they not mention this in your high school history classes? I grew up in Friesland and it would be interesting if that turned out to be more like a part of the "regional" than the "national" history curriculum. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terp