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Spread throughout the landscape of the southern and the eastern parts of the Netherlands are a number of large boulders, loosely placed in the rural landscape, in city squares or, in one case, close to the John Frost Bridge in the city of Arnhem, which was bridge central in the Battle of Arnhem in 1944. The alien boulders, placed mostly in the countryside, are part of the Liberation Route – a still expanding cultural route centred on events in the southern and eastern regions of the Netherlands during the final stages of the Second World War. The regions played an important role in the march of the Allies from Normandy to Berlin. In September 1944 the Allies reached the Belgian-Dutch border, and, in an attempt to end the war before Christmas, started ‘Operation Market Garden’ to invade Germany through the Netherlands. They undertook large-scale airborne-landings and an infantry advance from Belgium through Northern Brabant to the bridges over the Maas, Waal and Rhine Rivers in order to cut off the Germans in the west of the Netherlands and then to push on to the Ruhr Valley and, finally, to Berlin. Nijmegen and most parts of Northern Brabant were liberated, but the conquest of Arnhem failed, bringing millions of Dutch citizens above the Rhine to the edge of starvation that winter. The John Frost Bridge still carries symbolic meanings as the place where the liberation of Europe was temporarily halted.

Interest in history has moved to centre stage in Western culture. Its popularity extends to television, films, books, video games, theatre, and even to the street. The past is omnipresent in popular culture and daily life and its role is complex. Historical films, adventure games, war commemorations, vintage cars, retro fashion, and music performances on authentic instruments are just a few of the many ways in which the old, the past, and the original are ceaselessly brought back to life.