FRISIA.

The Frisii Frisians were the ancients who inhabited the northern shores of Germany; one people, with one set of customs, even though they were spread across a long distance along the German coastline. Beginning in the West at Holland, they extend eastward through Guelders, the Yssel (the mouth of the Rhine), the dioceses of Utrecht, Münster, and Bremen, all the way to the river Elbe. Then, from the side of Holstein, the region turns toward Jutland, which is also called the Cimbric Chersonese, broken up at times by marshes (which Tacitus calls immense lakes) and at other times by inlets of the sea. Within these borders, the Ems flows into the ocean near Emden. The river Iadera the Jade, mentioned by Ptolemy and commonly called the Jada, washes against the Frisians; the adjacent coast from there is called Budiagen. But the Vidrus the Weser, flowing between the Busactores those who live near the woods, now the Westphalians and the Frisians, and entering the sea between the Rhine and the Ems, is called the Black Wave original: "Nigra vnda". Today, their name does not extend so widely; they are divided by the river Ems into Western and Eastern Frisians. The Western Frisians (according to the author Jacobus Daventriensis) claimed the name of Frisia as if it were their own by the most ancient right, and it has always been considered superior to the others. It extends from the Yssel, or the extreme mouth of the Rhine, to the river Ems, and encompasses Ostergo, Westergo, the Seven Forests, the renowned city of Groningen, and the surrounding territory. It is abundant in livestock and pastures, and cultivated with villages and buildings more than any other region. To this, Overijssel is joined along with Drenthe and Twente. All of these flourish happily under the hereditary dominion of the Dukes of Burgundy. Eastern Frisia, although it once recognized (albeit grudgingly) the Counts of Holland as its lords, today enjoys its own Count. Petrus Olivarius says in his annotations on Mela, when speaking of Western Frisia, that he never saw a region so narrow possess so many parishes. He says there were some who offered this reason for so many churches: they tell of a contention that once arose among the nobles of that tract regarding their place within those temples, for they all wanted to have the first place. As this contention grew day by day, those who could afford it decided to erect their own parishes in their own villages. Thus, each one seized the first place for himself in his own seat, and hence there are so many churches. That is his account, and one may also see more on this in the Saxony of Albertus Crantzius.