Why go
The Rhine was a frontier as well as a waterway. Roman towns developed along this boundary, while communities on either side traded, served in the army and sometimes fought the empire. This context connects Nijmegen and Voorburg to a wider border region, rather than treating Roman history as a single episode shared equally across the country.
The full story
Roman conquest brought the land south of the Rhine into an empire that stretched far beyond the Low Countries. The river became its northern frontier, known as the limes. Towns including Nijmegen and Voorburg developed within this border landscape. The boundary did not separate two worlds completely. The Frisii north of the Rhine remained outside Roman rule, while nearby groups such as the Batavi and Cananefates served in Roman cavalry units. Military service could bring close ties without ending conflict: the Batavi rebelled in AD 69 and were defeated. In the later Roman period, new alliances changed the political map. Salian Franks appear in Roman accounts as both allies and enemies, and some were eventually allowed to settle within imperial territory. Reading the Rhine as a changing frontier helps explain why Roman history is especially closely associated with the southern part of the Netherlands.