People do not always stay in the place where they were born. This website presents maps that show the dispersion of people in The Netherlands during the 20th century at the level of municipalities. Per municipality it is shown where the ancestors of the current residents came from, and where descendants of the inhabitants of a century ago were born and where they live nowadays.
There are maps of The Netherlands that show where residents, who were between the ages of 30 and 50 in 2007, of some municipality were born. But also maps that show the place of birth of their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. Reversely, one can start with the persons that were born in a specific municipality between 1880 en 1900, and choose maps that show where their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren were born and their place of residence in 2007.
The maps show the distances people move from their ancestors, for several generations. This is important to understand the dispersion of, for instance, dialects, family names, traditions and cultural expressions.
It is not only possible to choose one of the 443 municipalities of The Netherlands as a target area, but also one of 40 regions, 24 dialect areas, or 12 provinces. For each of these target areas, the birthplaces of ancestors or the current residence of decedents are still shown at the municipality level.
To get an impression of whether males and females have different migration patterns, it is also possible to explore dispersion along the matrilineal or patrilineal lines.
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Gerrit Bloothooft and David Onland (Utrecht University) application development: Section Technical Development (Meertens Institute KNAW)