[8] In 2004, the Dutch government confirmed this resolution, putting in place a three-year scheme to oversee the name change and associated cultural programme.

[9] The province of Friesland is occasionally referred to as "Frisia" by, amongst others, Hanno Brand, head of the history and literature department at the Fryske Akademy since 2009.

[11] The Frisii were among the migrating Germanic tribes that, following the breakup of Celtic Europe in the 4th century BC, settled along the North Sea.

[14] In his Germania, Tacitus described all the Germanic peoples of the region as having elected kings with limited powers and influential military leaders who led by example rather than by authority.

Their tentative existence in the 4th century is confirmed by archaeological discovery of a type of earthenware unique to 4th-century Frisia, called terp Tritzum, showing that an unknown number of Frisii were resettled in Flanders and Kent,[19] likely as laeti under the aforementioned Roman coercion.

The lands of the Frisii were largely abandoned by c. 400 as a result of the conflicts of the Migration Period, climate deterioration, and the flooding caused by a rise in the sea level.

The area lay empty for one or two centuries, when changing environmental and political conditions made the region habitable again.

At that time, during the Migration Period, "new" Frisians (probably descended from a merging of Frisii, Angles, Saxons and Jutes) repopulated the coastal regions.

[20][21]: 792  These Frisians consisted of tribes with loose bonds, centred on war bands but without great power.

The earliest Frisian records name four social classes, the 'ethelings (nobiles in Latin documents; adel in Dutch and German) and frilings (vrijen in Dutch and Freien in German), who together made up the "Free Frisians" who might bring suit at court, and the laten or liten with the slaves, who were absorbed into the laten during the Early Middle Ages, as slavery was not so much formally abolished, as evaporated.

[22]: 202 Under the rule of King Aldgisl, the Frisians came in conflict with the Frankish mayor of the palace Ebroin, over the old Roman border fortifications.

The Carolingians laid Frisia under the rule of grewan, a title that has been loosely related to count in its early sense of "governor" rather than "feudal overlord".

With their victory in the Battle of Norditi in 884 they were able to drive the Vikings permanently out of East Frisia, although it remained under constant threat.

Over the centuries, whilst feudal lords reigned in the rest of Europe, no aristocratic structures emerged in Frisia.

[26] After significant territories were lost to Holland in the Friso-Hollandic Wars, Frisia saw an economic downturn in the mid-14th century.

Accompanied by a decline in monasteries and other communal institutions, social discord led to the emergence of untitled nobles called haadlingen ("headmen"), wealthy landowners possessing large tracts of land and fortified homes[27] who took over the role of the judiciary as well as offering protection to their local inhabitants.

On 21 March 1498,[28] a small group of Skieringers from Westergo secretly met with Albert III, Duke of Saxony, the Governor of the Habsburg Netherlands, in Medemblik requesting his help.

[30] In 1515, an army of haadlingen and peasants, with the help of mercenaries known as the Arumer Zwarte Hoop, started a fight for freedom from oppression by the Habsburg authorities.

[31] One of the leaders was Pier Gerlofs Donia, whose farm had been burned down and whose kinfolk had been killed by a marauding Landsknecht regiment.

He appointed Georg Schenck van Toutenburg, who had crushed the peasants' revolt, as Stadtholder to rule over the province in his stead.

In 1798, three years after the Batavian Revolution, the provincial lordship of Frisia was abolished and its territory was divided between the Eems and Oude IJssel departments.

The years 1880–1900 show slower population growth due to an agricultural recession during which some 20,000 Frisians emigrated to the United States.

Tourism is another important source of income: the principal tourist destinations include the lakes in the southwest of the province and the islands in the Wadden Sea to the north.

All parents in Friesland receive, at their children's birth, information about language and multilingualism (e.g. 'taaltaske'[clarification needed]).

[50] The province is famous for its speed skaters, with mass participation in cross-country ice skating when weather conditions permit.

A jump consists of an intense sprint to the pole (polsstok), jumping and grabbing it, then climbing to the top while trying to control the pole's forward and lateral movements over a body of water and finishing with a graceful landing on a sand bed opposite to the starting point.

Because of all the diverse skills required in fierljeppen, fierljeppers are considered to be very complete athletes with superbly developed strength and coordination.

In the warmer months, many Frisians practice wadlopen, the traditional art of wading across designated sections of the Wadden Sea at low tide.

and SC Heerenveen (home stadium Abe Lenstra Stadion) active in de Eredivisie(1st div.).