The aim of the project is to unravel the genetic and contact relations between the indigenous languages of Mesoamerica (Mexico and western Central America) and the Middle Andes region (Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia), as part of a larger endeavor to understand the historical process of the peopling of the Americas…

The bottom-up development of post-Roman northwestern Europe

Friday 25 September, 2015 marks the official launch of Leiden University's Central and East European Studies (CEES) Center.

Leiden University offers ambitious students the latest knowledge and the freedom to develop their own area of expertise.

This dissertation is a study of archaeological remains left behind by nomadic communities in the Black Desert, situated in the northeast of modern Jordan.

The Journal of the LUCAS Graduate Conference was founded in 2013 to publish a selection of the best papers presented at the biennial LUCAS Graduate Conference, an international and interdisciplinary humanities conference organized by the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS). The…

To be eligible for History, Arts and Culture of Asia at Leiden University, you must meet the following admission requirements.

Update : March 2020 Director: Professor Dr Harco Willems (KU Leuven), co-director Dr Marleen De Meyer (KU Leuven & NVIC)

Today, globalization makes us all aware of how closely we are connected to, and often dependent upon, the actions of people who are distant from us. Human migration and economic liberalization have confronted local communities with changes happening on a global level. How can we devise ways to share…

This dissertation provides a detailed description of the interaction between verb semantics and the two grammatical voice categories in the Vedic Sanskrit of the Rigveda.

This study seeks to partially fill the knowledge gap about national culture in Africa, basing its research on data on ethnolinguistic groups (instead of administrative regions).

Jelle van Buuren, Assistant Professor at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs, discusses the death of Al-Baghdadi and whether this could also mean the end of IS.

The current migration flow into Europa demands effective measures. Leiden experts examine whether these measures are legal and hold up a mirror to policy-makers.

Alumni event

The conquest by Rome brought profound changes to large parts of Europe. Unprecedented infrastructural works such as roads and harbours were created, towns sprang up, a ribbon of fortresses was laid out along the frontiers and there is a vast increase in material culture to inform us about the lives…

The MCS group consists of five staff members, all of whom have a strong link to the Museums and Collections programme of the Faculty of Humanities and the Heritage and Museum programme of the Faculty of Archaeology.

Study information

For three millennia, carved sculptures were ubiquitous among ancient peoples in the Americas. Sculpted in stone, metal or wood, they developed into the well-known totem poles, colossal Olmec heads, royal Maya stelae and golden Inca statues.

Silk Road Virtual Museum - A virtual museum of the art and culture of the regions that lay on the trade routes between Europe and Asia, popularly known as the ‘Silk Road’.

This section provides an overview of online tools for the study of the medieval Low Countries. The websites linked down below are often times both available in Dutch and English.

The MA Neerlandistiek/Dutch Studies at Leiden University provides you with an international view on the Dutch language and culture. You will be able to study the full breadth of Dutch studies: from the Middle Ages to today.

In the master’s programme in Older Dutch literature at Leiden University you will study Dutch literature from the Middle Ages (1100-1550) until the Golden Age and Enlightenment (1550-1800). During the programme you will develop a vision on the value of the Dutch literary heritage.

Asian Studies at Leiden University is unparalleled in the Netherlands and combines the very best of Asia-related research in North-West Europe.

The story of the iconic Silk Road is often told from the Chinese perspective. An exhibition at Oude UB focuses on the inhabitants and monuments of historical cities in Central Asia, a neglected part of the Silk Road. From 5 September to 17 October.

What follows is a survey of existing programs and current projects for each of the participating universities.

Lecture, LUCIS What's New?! Series

In the research master Politics, Culture and National Identities, 1789 to the Present at Leiden University you will be at the forefront of a new approach to understand how politics and identities in Europe are conceived.

This special issue of Contemporary Levant critically explores, at a micro and macro level, the structural role and religious, cultural and political interactions of the Greek-Orthodox, Melkite and Syriac communities in late Ottoman and Mandate Syria and Palestine.

This book presents a thorough analysis of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq’s memory culture, focusing particularly on commemorations and representations of the Anfal and Halabja atrocities.

On Thursday 9 December, Dr Upik Djalins presented an online lecture, entitled 'The Colonial Bureaucratic Network versus the Metropole: The Origin Story of Land Alienation Prohibition in the 1870s East Indies'.

The Benelux Association for the Study of Art, Culture, and the Environment (BASCE) is a platform for all those who are actively engaged in ecocriticism to discuss their various endeavours with peers from different disciplines and an array of intellectual, creative, or activist pursuits.

In November, Somalia was the latest country to join the East African Community (EAC). This follows the Democratic Republic of Congo's accession to the regional intergovernmental organisation in March.

On Thursday 28 March 2024 Said Reza Huseini successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Do you want to know more about Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology and what it is like to study in Leiden? Come to our online or on campus information events.

The programme focuses on the medieval dynamics of intellectual life in the Rhineland and the Low countries, nowadays divided over five countries (Switzerland, France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands) but one cultural region in the later Middle Ages.

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

Playing a musical instrument is generally considered to be a complex human behaviour involving the integration and coordination of a broad range of human functions such as perception, imagination, memory, information processing, emotion, communication, and dexterity.