My current research focuses on criminality and gender interactions in nineteenth-century Europe. This project uses a comparative methodology to explain gender constructions in a criminal and in a court setting.

The first objective is to create a catalogue raisonée, i.e. a structured database that will store the main attributes of each town in a standardized format database, which will be freely accessible when completed; the second objective is to exploit theories and methods that can help us to understand…

This year, the Leiden University Institute for History ranks #29 in the QS World University Rankings by Subject. With this, the institute ranks as the second best in The Netherlands for the subject History.

Hanan Hammad and Eftychia Mylona give a master class focusing on conceptual and methodological challenges in writing histories of marginalized social groups.

Two statues of gorillas abducting women: they were what led PhD candidate Dick van Broekhuizen to write a new type of history of nineteenth-century sculpture. ‘If you view nineteenth-century art history from a less narrow perspective, the narrative changes completely.’ PhD ceremony on 21 June.

How do we explain the fact that certain areas had many large cities, while other areas were studded with large numbers of small towns and yet other areas had very few urban agglomerations of any kind?

The philosophers at the Institute of Philosophy develop new perspectives and insights not only on fundamental philosophical questions, but also on topical and interdisciplinary themes such as secrecy, migration, climate change, the politics of truth and intercultural relations.

On 8 February 2021 Leiden University celebrated its 446th anniversary.

5 talented Leiden humanities scholars have received a Vidi research subsidy of 800.000 euros to set up or expand their own line of research.

This is a good time for it to happen, in the opinion of Professor of Fatherlands History, Henk te Velde. The abdication of Queen Beatrix is a good starting point for celebrating 200 years of the Dutch monarchy, in 2013. Te Velde is a member of the National Committee for 200 Years of Monarchy: 'By standing…

Systematisch geordend naslagwerk voor alle stadsrechten in Nederland

This dissertation explores how domestic political power struggles in Greece and Turkey during the Cold War engaged with the ongoing conflict in Cyprus and aims to demonstrate how socialist parties in Greece and Turkey struggled with the concept of the “nation” in battling for power and political positioning…

The Leiden Ancient History specialization concentrates on the study of the economies, societies and cultures of the large empires of the Graeco-Roman world, starting with the empires of Alexander the Great and his successors. The appearance of these empires led to the development of an interaction network…

Julie Svalastog is one of the four PhDs in Cátia Antunes’ ERC Research Project 'Fighting Monopolies'.

New Report Launched by ACPF with the support of the Department of Child Law and Health Law

Economic Anthropologist Erik Bähre talks on the Dutch News Radio Channel BNR about the effects of the Russia-Ukraine grain agreement for African countries.

In the context of the Erasmus+ programme on ‘International Credit Mobility’, 17 exchange grants, with a joint worth of €83.000, were awarded to an exchange project between Leiden and East Africa.

A new paperback edition of Brian Heffernan's book Freedom and the Fifth Commandment. Catholic priests and political violence in Ireland, 1919-21 was published by Manchester University Press in September 2016.

Inspired by a critical reconsideration of current monolithic approaches to the study of Greek religion, this book argues that ancient Greeks displayed a disquieting capacity to validate two (or more) dissonant, if not contradictory, representations of the divine world in a complementary rather than…

This open access book explores the role of continuity in political processes and practices during the Age of Revolutions.

A new memorial stone on the facade of a student house in the Hugo de Grootstraat is a reminder of the dozens of Indonesian students who studied in Leiden before and during the Second World War. Some of them were active in the Resistance, which cost a number of them their lives.

Lecture

From the very beginning, the Islam has known an oral tradition. It was only two hundred years ago that Muslims starting writing about the history of Islam, on rocks or other hard materials. Arabic epigraphy (study of inscriptions) turns out to be an essential tool in historical genealogy research. Abdullah…

The changing status of anatomical collections from the early modern period to date.

NIMAR is the Netherlands expertise centre for Moroccan Studies. Starting 2016, NIMAR is a part of the Faculty of Humanities of Leiden University. NIMAR organises lectures, facilitates research and actively adds to the knowledge of Moroccan languages, cultures and society in The Netherlands.

Do you want to know the best reasons to study at Leiden University or want to know what's it like to live in the student cities Leiden or The Hague? Our students tell you why you have to choose Leiden University to study your bachelor's programme.

Do you want to know the best reasons to study at Leiden University or want to know what's it like to live in the student cities Leiden or The Hague? Our students tell you why you have to choose Leiden University to study your bachelor's programme.

My research project focuses on the development of a popular national agency in late nineteenth century Amsterdam and the question how ‘ordinary’ citizens imagined ‘the Netherlands’ through the experience and use of their urban surroundings.

Why is Crossnational and Cross-cultural agents such as Henrich Carloff and Willem Leyel important when studying Early Modern expansion?

A shepherd, but also a comparativist and historian with very broad interests. That is how Professor Philippe Buc describes himself. As of 1 August 2021, he will hold the chair of professor of Medieval History at the university. In an introductory interview, Buc introduces himself, his research and his…

The central aim is to systematically study differences in crime patterns and social control between migrants and non-migrants in early modern Frankfurt am Main.

This PhD project studies immigrant groups in ancient Babylonia and aims at investigating their identities, socioeconomic status, and integration into an ancient multicultural society.

The figure of the barbarian has captivated the Western imagination from Greek antiquity to the present. Since the 1990s, the rhetoric of civilization versus barbarism has taken center stage in Western political rhetoric and the media. But how can the longevity and popularity of this opposition be accounted…

This volume presents fourteen papers by Roman archaeologists and historians discussing approaches to the economic history of Pompeii, and the role of the Pompeian evidence in debates about the Roman economy.

From Galileo Galilei to Albert Einstein and from Anna Maria van Schurman to Anton de Kom: only a selection of the 25 authors who's books and ideas had extraordinary historical impact, in some cases even to this day. Leiden University Libraries and the National Museum of Antiquities jointly present the…

History lecturer Giles Scott-Smith is enthusiastic about the new pitch-to-peer programme (P2P), for which students have to make an original, creative assignment and evaluate one another’s work. This is part five in a series of articles about lecturers and innovation in teaching and learning.

Fanny Wonu Veys was appointed Professor of Art and Material Culture of Oceania on 1 August. Time for an introduction.

Episode 1: The Golden Horde in a Global Perspective: Imperial Strategies. This project intends to challenge the conventional way of considering the nomadic state organizations and the role of Nomads in world history.

On the occasion of the retirement of Robert Ross, Professor in African History at Leiden University, his successor and former student Jan-Bart Gewald wrote a valedictory note.

How were the Russians, under early modern conditions, able to incorporate this distant, undeveloped and, because frequent nomadic attacks, dangerous territory? And what role did the Kolyvan-Voskresensk plants play in this process?

The biographer of Leiden University, Willem Otterspeer, has a new book out. In ‘De stad, de dood en de dichters’ (The City, Death and the Poets) he combines his love for the University and poetry with autobiographical reflections. ‘With my magnifying glass I discovered yet more new details in the pr…

The main objective of this research is to map out the cities of the Roman Near East in the imperial period, with a focus on location, city size and urban features, in order to study the form the urban system and its levels of integration.

A group of confidants including a former student of Meijers managed to avert his deportation to a death camp. In her lecture on 27 November, Cleveringa Professor Marjan Schwegman revealed the history of the persecution of the Jewish Professor Eduard Meijers.

The Animated Image addresses the entire range of contexts in which images were described by Roman authors as being animated, as well as the accounts that Roman writers produced to explain the animation of inanimate matter.

Historical geo data are gaining in importance. Provided that they are exactly geo referenced, they can be stored into a GIS and thus be combined with all kinds of maps (topographical, pedological, etc.) and datasets. This makes it possible to analyze historical developments in space and time on a detailed…

This project examines changes in late eighteenth and nineteenth-century representations of the legendary twelfth-century general Minamoto no Yoshitsune (1159-1189) and how they reflect not only developments in themes of representation, but also changes in the focus of early modern and modern Japan’s…

This programme aims to make the digitized archival sources of the Kerala and Tamil Nadu Archives more accessible to Indian and international scholars and to the widest possible audience, in particular to the people of Kerala.

Three new initiatives will provide a more diverse view of Leiden’s academic history, literally and figuratively: a historical study on the background of students and scientists, a new book about the Academy Building, and two new sculptures of female scientists, Ewine van Dishoek, Professor of Molecular…