Lutjegast is a village

Village

A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...

 in the Westerkwartier

Westerkwartier

The Westerkwartier is a historical region in the Dutch province of Groningen, at the border with the province of Friesland. In the past the area was part of the historical region of Frisia. The Frisian language is still spoken in the western parts of the area...

 area of Groningen

Groningen (province)

Groningen [] is the northeasternmost province of the Netherlands. In the east it borders the German state of Niedersachsen , in the south Drenthe, in the west Friesland and in the north the Wadden Sea...

 in the Netherlands

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

. It is administered as part of the municipality Grootegast

Grootegast

Grootegast is a municipality and a village in the northeastern Netherlands. It is the sister city of Kingston, Tasmania.- Population centres :Doezum, Enumatil, Faan, Grootegast, Kornhorn, Lutjegast, Niekerk, Oldekerk, Opende, Sebaldeburen....

.

(In the Groningen dialect

Dialect

The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...

 of Dutch

Dutch language

Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...

 'Lutje' means small or little. A 'gast' or 'gaast' is a higher, sandy ridge in an otherwise swampy area.)

Lutjegast was the birth place of the explorer Abel Tasman

Abel Tasman

Abel Janszoon Tasman was a Dutch seafarer, explorer, and merchant, best known for his voyages of 1642 and 1644 in the service of the VOC . His was the first known European expedition to reach the islands of Van Diemen's Land and New Zealand and to sight the Fiji islands...

. Although the house of his birth no longer exists, he is memorialised with a monument, plaque and street name.

Until 1829 a manor named "Rikkerdaborg" stood in Lutjegast.