Editing Staphorst (section)

==History==
{{unreferenced section|date=July 2012}}
The villages of Staphorst and its southern neighbour Rouveen came into existence as in the 13th century [[monk]]s started to bring the [[bog]]s and [[swamp]]s into culture.

All the farms were built along the long road through the bog area. Thus a lengthy row of farms was built, becoming the {{convert|11|km|abbr=on|0}} long village of Staphorst-Rouveen. This phenomenon is called in Dutch: ''lintbebouwing'' ([[Ribbon development|ribbon urbanization]]). In many parts of the Netherlands this type of village is quite common, e.g. [[Vriezenveen]], the villages along river [[Dike (construction)|dykes]] in the Netherlands, the so-called moor-colonies in the provinces [[Drenthe]] and [[Groningen (province)|Groningen]], as well as the German regions opposite the border.

Staphorst was a Dutch municipality, created through a decree by French emperor Napoleon who merged four smaller entities into a much larger one.  The 1811 decree merged the villages of Rouveen, Staphorst and IJhorst along with nearby sparsely populated Hasselter schoutambt (a judicial entity) into a municipality, known since 1818 as Staphorst.  Except for a few minor changes, Staphorst's borders have remained unchanged, making it an anomaly in Dutch municipal history.<ref>http://www.godutch.com/newspaper/index.php?id=1976&search=Staphorst</ref>

A specialty for Staphorst is, that after a farmer's death, his land was often divided between his sons. The son who did not inherit his father's farm built a farm-house for his own behind the other. Therefore, many pieces of farmland are very lengthy, yet narrow (e.g. 1500 x 40 metres). Originally, each piece of land was 125 metres wide.<ref name="Over-Staphorst">{{in lang|nl}} Over Staphorst, [http://www.staphorst.nl/internet/over-staphorst_228/item/staphorst-vroeger_295.html "Staphorst vroeger,"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120728002044/http://www.staphorst.nl/internet/over-staphorst_228/item/staphorst-vroeger_295.html |date=28 July 2012 }} Gemeente Staphorst.</ref>

The farms are of the traditional Low Saxon type. They have green doors and window shutters. Most farms existing now were built between 1850 and 1910.