Stephenson:Neal:Quicksilver:477:Ijselmeer (Neville Kuyt)

From the Quicksilver Metaweb.

The body of water known as the IJsselmeer is actually a recent invention. It was created in 1932 by the creation of the afsluitdijk, which turned the former Zuiderzee (Sea of the South) into a freshwater lake. In Jack and Eliza's day, it would have been known as the Zuyderzee.

Absolutely true! I was going to make a comment on that, but you already made the effort. Jan van Vliet (not related to Mr. Van Vliet in the book as far as I know...)

Moreover, on this same page '...they were in a long plaza called "the Damplatz"...' The Dam in Amsterdam was never called "the Damplatz". "Platz" is a German word. In the early days of Amsterdam (1300), "de Dam" was sometimes called "de Plaetse". But now and since we speak of "de Dam". The only reference I can find about a "platz" in Amsterdam is that of an Enlgish (of course!) traveller Fynes Moryson, who called it "Campplatz". (see Geert Mak: Amsterdam. The brief life of a city).

Additionally, Mr Stephenson obviously isn't familiar with the way the Dutch capitalize the letter "ij": it's "IJsselmeer", not "Ijsselmeer".