This book is an attempt to reconstruct the complete picture of the arrival of foreigners in the Netherlands from the six-teenth century onwards and to describe how they acquired a place in Dutch society. This is done by combining and integrating the sociological approach with the historical one. The authors turn their attention not only to the foreigners themselves, and their place in society, but also to the question of how their descendants have fared. Jan Lucassen is head of the Research Department of the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam and Professor of social history at the Free University of Amsterdam. Rinus Penninx is professorial director of the interdisciplinary research Institute of Migration and Ethnic Studies (imes) at the University of Amsterdam.