Qualla: Vriezenveen

Vriezenveen: Introduction

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CEphoto, Uwe Aranas, CC BY-SA 3.0. In 1720, a handful of men from a remote Dutch peat village climbed into wagons and set off for Saint Petersburg, then less than two decades old. They went to trade, and they were good at it. By the 19th century, businesses founded by Vriezenveeners ran shops on the Nevsky Prospekt and inside the Gostiny Dvor arcade, in the heart of the Russian capital. They had a name there: Rusluie, the Russia people. For 197 years a tight-knit Twente community lived and worked in the city at the mouth of the Neva, speaking among themselves in their own dialect, before the Revolution of 1917 closed the chapter.

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Image: CEphoto, Uwe Aranas | CC BY-SA 3.0

Vriezenveen: A Charter for the Frisians

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Rob Dammers, CC BY 2.0. The earliest record of Vriezenveen dates from 1364, when Evert van Hekeren, lord of Almelo, wrote a charter for the free Frisians colonising the moor above his lands. Their rent was paid in butter: one bucket a year per family, measured by the standard of Zwolle, delivered to Hui...

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Image: Rob Dammers | CC BY 2.0

Vriezenveen: Rebuilt on a Sandy Road

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Michielverbeek, CC BY-SA 4.0. When Vriezenveen was rebuilt after the destruction of 1666, the survivors did not return to the old Buterweg. Instead they laid out a new village along a sandy road to the north, the current Hammerweg-Westeinde-Oosteinde axis. They built it long. The continuous village street now...

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Image: Michielverbeek | CC BY-SA 4.0

Vriezenveen: The Rusluie

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit J.H. Gallée (Fotograaf), CC BY-SA 4.0. From 1720 until 1917, Vriezenveeners ran a trading colony in Saint Petersburg that punched dramatically above the village's weight. They were called Rusluie, the Russia people, and their houses stood on some of the most prestigious streets in the Russian capital. Hendrik Kruys ow...

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Image: J.H. Gallée (Fotograaf) | CC BY-SA 4.0

Vriezenveen: The Great Fire of 1905

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Rob Dammers, CC BY 2.0. On 16 May 1905, fire broke out in Vriezenveen and almost destroyed the entire town. Dry weather, thatched roofs, and a strong east wind drove the flames; 228 houses burned. The Jansen and Tilanus textile factory, then the largest employer in the village, was spared when the fire ...

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Image: Rob Dammers | CC BY 2.0

Vriezenveen: Vjeans, War Children, and What Remains

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Michielverbeek, CC BY-SA 4.0. The local language, Vriezenveens or Vjeans, sounds different from the Twents spoken in surrounding villages. Some linguists hear Frisian roots in it, plausibly, given the village's founding. Others have argued the Saint Petersburg colony shaped it, though that seems less likely. ...

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Image: Michielverbeek | CC BY-SA 4.0