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I was recently in the Netherlands and noticed it is remarkably free of forests, which led me to wonder how they got timber for their ships back in the day.

I guess there are two possible answers:

1. The reason the country is deforested is that the forests were invested in a fleet

If this is the case, I'm wondering where these large forests were, and what sort of trees the Dutch Republic used to have.

2. They got timber from somewhere else

If this is the case... from where did they get the timber? Down the Rhine from Swabia I guess could be a possibility, or maybe from Scandinavia and the Baltic, but the latter possibility begs the question of how you would transport enough without already having a very efficient navy.

I assume possibility (1) occurred either way, even if most of the wood (or maybe the best of the wood?) would have to arrive via (2). So I guess my question is more related to how extensive (2) was and from whom they purchased.

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    Documenting preliminary research will improve both the probability of an answer and the quality of the answer(s). At a minimum, all questions should explain why Wikipedia is insufficient.
    – MCW ♦
    Commented Nov 21 at 18:26
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    There are actually two rivers that lead up to forrested mountain regions: the Rhine (all the mountain ranges south of Cologne) and the Meuse (Lothringia/Ardennes).
    – ccprog
    Commented Nov 21 at 18:37
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    I think you would want to specify the time frame you are interested in. My knowledge is only cursory, but my impression is that there were two distinct periods: (1) up to about the middle of the 17th century Dutch timber imports mostly came from the coastal regions of both the Baltic Sea and the North Sea (2) thereafter timber rafting from the Black Forest down the Rhine became a major factor, culminating in timber transport using gigantic articulated rafts up to 300 meters in length in the 19th century.
    – njuffa
    Commented Nov 22 at 5:33
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    Not an answer as I cannot find the original source, I remember the story of an adventurer in the 17th century, who was hired as member of the crew of a raft down the Rhine, transporting timber. The raft itself was the timber. However, as they could only go downwards, the owner of the rafts convinced many of the crew to enlist into the Dutch navy on arrival, as otherwise they would need a long and arduous journey back home on foot, across war-torn territory. The owner was actually in cahoots with the recruiters, and received half the enlistment bonus. So the Dutch got both timber and recruits.
    – vsz
    Commented Nov 22 at 7:36
  • "the latter possibility begs the question of how you would transport enough without already having a very efficient navy." A possibility that seems obvious to me is that lumber might be constructed into ships in the country of origin, rather than shipped to the Netherlands and turned into ships there. It seems logical that at the least the initial ships to transport further lumber would be so constructed.
    – Acccumulation
    Commented Nov 24 at 5:55

2 Answers 2

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As they said at the time: "Amsterdam is standing on Norway". Or as a recent article put it:

During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Dutch Republic heavily relied on imported timber for the construction of its cities, dikes, and ships. This timber originated from the Baltic Sea, the German Rhineland, and the "Little East," but primarily from the coastal areas of southern Norway.

A dendroarcheological study of the wreck of the Batavia found:

that the VOC successfully coped with timber shortages in the early 17th century through diversification of timber sources (mainly Baltic region, Lübeck hinterland in northern Germany, and Lower Saxony in northwest Germany), allocation of sourcing regions to specific timber products (hull planks from the Baltic and Lübeck, framing elements from Lower Saxony) and skillful woodworking craftmanship (sapwood was removed from all timber elements).

If you want more detail, I would check de Vries and van der Woude (1997) (on the overall Dutch economy of the time, rich with data) and Bender (2014) (all about Dutch Golden Age warships, including details of construction)).

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    Lots of timber trade out of the Baltic Sea to the Netherlands, Great Britain, etc.
    – Jon Custer
    Commented Nov 21 at 22:04
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    Unless I misremember my Dutch "van der Woude" means "de Forest" ;-)
    – Italian Philosopher
    Commented Nov 22 at 2:41
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    @ItalianPhilosopher "of the Forest" literally, their ancestors probably lived in or near a forest and worked there.
    – jwenting
    Commented Nov 22 at 7:35
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    Dutch import of German trees was not limited to the Rhineland, but also came further upstream from Rhine, Main, probably Mosel. Amusingly, the Spessartmuseum in Lohr am Main (Bavaria) claims that Amsterdam is standing on trees from the Spessart :)
    – gerrit
    Commented Nov 22 at 7:46
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    Thank you for your answer. I wonder if @njuffa 's contribuition from the comment on the original question is accurate and could be incorporated here (i.e. that originally timber came from norway and the baltics, and later from germany). It's interesting because if anything I would have expected the chronology to be the other way around.
    – TheChymera
    Commented Nov 22 at 13:54
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... it is remarkably free of forests

You probably were in the coastal provinces: North or South Holland, Frisia, Groningen or Zealand. Yes, you are right. Not a lot of trees there. The Dutch didn't grow trees. The coastal provincies were too marshy for harvesting timber, and the land provinces never had enough.

That means your option 1 is out. Option 2 is correct:

They got it through commerce with the Baltic Sea countries and Norway. The import of grain and timber was vital for the economy. Grain was exported to other countries, timber was used to build ships with. Commerce with Norway brought in a lot of timber and dried fish, paid for with grain. Ships could ship goods to Prussia or the Baltics, sell it for grain, sell the grain in Norway for timber and ship that to Amsterdam.

Which made Copenhagen (Sont Passage) crucial. A Dutch diplomat (van Beuningen) remarked once to the king of Denmark: your majesty, the keys of the Sont are not in Copenhagen but in Amsterdam. It is often ascribed to Michiel de Ruyter, but that is not true. Though he did fight in the Baltic Sea to protect Dutch interests.

The trade with Norway and especially the Baltic was far more important for the republic than the trade with the West Indies (WIC) and East Indies (VOC).

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    The statement "The trade with Norway and especially the Baltic was far more important for the republic than the trade with the West Indies (WIC) and East Indies (VOC)." is risible. It was the trade with the East and West Indies that paid for the Baltic timber imports. No-one was giving that timber away for free.
    – Pieter Geerkens
    Commented Nov 22 at 3:55
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    @PieterGeerkens That is debatable. The trade with Norway and the Baltic nations is what made everything else possible. Those trade routes were wel established before the WIC and VOC began. Without it, no WIC and no VOC. I never said the timber was given away for free. That claim is risible. I based my answer on prof. Israel's book The Dutch Republic, where he states the same. Maybe you can contact him (if still alive) and inform him he's wrong.
    – Jos
    Commented Nov 22 at 4:10
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    You're conflating merchant marine, not the subject of the question, with navies, which is the subject of the question. Certainly the Dutch were traders through the middle ages; but they don't have navies until after they organize the East and West Indian trade.
    – Pieter Geerkens
    Commented Nov 22 at 4:44
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    @PieterGeerkens which was paid for by trade. You need to have money to buy a navy. Not the other way around.
    – Jos
    Commented Nov 22 at 4:48
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    @PieterGeerkens, the distinction between "merchant marine" and "navy" is a recent one. For most of history, it was common for combat ships to engage in trade, and merchant ships to be impressed into the navy during times of war.
    – Mark
    Commented Nov 23 at 1:24

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