Texel

Texel became an island in 1170, when the All Saints' Flood broke through the land and cut it and Wieringen off from North Holland. It was then two islands, Texel proper in the south and Eierland in the north-east, joined only by shoals. In the 13th century Ada, Countess of Holland, was held prisoner here by her uncle, and in 1415 Texel received city rights. Early in the 17th century a dyke joined Eierland to the main island, and in the mid-19th century a polder filled in the northern half.

The waters off the island mattered more than the land. The Reede van Texel, the roadstead off Oudeschild, was for centuries one of the world's great anchorages, where Dutch East India Company ships from Amsterdam waited for a fair wind, and the first Dutch expedition to the Northeast Passage sailed from the island in 1594. The shallows wrecked many ships, among them, in 1643, the Palmwood ship carrying the household goods of Queen Henrietta Maria. Battles were fought offshore in the Anglo-Dutch Wars, and in 1779 the American captain John Paul Jones brought the captured frigate Serapis here for repairs.

The Second World War ended late on Texel. On 5 April 1945 Georgian soldiers of a German army battalion rose against their German comrades and fought them across the island until 20 May, two weeks after the German surrender in Europe, when Canadian troops arrived. The uprising is often called the last battle of the war in Europe, and the Georgian dead lie in a cemetery near the Hoge Berg. In 2002 the dunes of the west coast became a national park.

Texel's identity is that of an island set apart from the rest of North Holland. The old Tessels dialect is dying out, but local words and accents survive in everyday speech, the islanders refer to the mainland as de Overkant, and islanders born in Den Helder rather than on Texel are teasingly known as Helderse kraaien, crows from Den Helder. The island's own brewery gives its beers dialect names, and islanders own most of the shares in TESO, the ferry company that links them to the mainland.

Music and sport fill the calendar. Pop festivals such as Sommeltjespop and Texelpop, Strenderpop for Texel bands only, and a blues festival in Den Burg each October bring crowds, and Round Texel, the world's biggest catamaran race, has been held around the island since 1978. A half marathon is run every year.

Nature is part of the island's self-image. About a third of Texel is protected, and birdwatching, walks through the dunes and seal-spotting at Ecomare are as much a part of a stay as the beach. Texel also gave its name to a breed of sheep now raised in about thirty-five countries.

Texel had about 13,900 inhabitants at the start of 2026, roughly half of them in Den Burg, with the rest spread among De Koog, Oudeschild, Den Hoorn, De Cocksdorp and smaller hamlets. The island is about 24 kilometres long and 10 kilometres wide, with dunes along the west coast and flat polders on the Wadden Sea side.

Tourism dominates the economy, with around 70 per cent of activity in some way linked to it, and the population swells in summer with visitors staying in hotels, campsites and holiday parks. Farming remains the traditional base — sheep and dairy cattle graze the island, and potatoes, tulips and grain are grown — while Oudeschild is the home of the fishing fleet. The municipal council has 15 seats.

The rhythm of life follows the ferry and the seasons. The ferry Texelstroom, which runs largely on compressed natural gas, connects with buses to every village, and most islanders get around by bicycle on the dense network of cycle paths. Summers are busy and crowded around De Koog and the beaches; in winter many holiday businesses quieten and the island returns to its residents.

Sheep define Texel's food. Texel sheep are a heavy, muscular breed raised mainly for meat. Sheep's cheese from Texel was already known for its distinctive taste in the 16th and 17th centuries; alongside the ordinary white cheese, islanders once made a green cheese coloured by boiling sheep droppings in cloth and adding the juice to the milk, which gave it a sharp flavour and kept it longer, until food inspectors banned it on hygiene grounds in the 1930s.

The sea supplies the rest. Oudeschild's fishing fleet lands the catch, and fish shops by the harbour sell smoked eel, mussels, cod and prawns. The Texelse Bierbrouwerij near Oudeschild, owned by Heineken since 2020, brews Skuumkoppe, a wheat beer, among others, using local ingredients where it can. Juttertje, a herbal bitter made with fourteen herbs, has long been distilled on the island.

Texel Culinair is a recurring food event in De Koog. De Koog has the island's greatest concentration of restaurants and bars, while every village has at least a small supermarket.