A Companion to Cities in the Greco-Roman World offers in-depth coverage of the most important topics in the study of Greek and Roman urbanism. Bringing together contributions by an international panel of experts, this comprehensive resource addresses traditional topics in the study of ancient cities,…

Lecture, Research Seminar Medieval and Early Modern History

Lecture, Research Seminar Medieval and Early Modern History

The MA programme in Art History is unique in upholding a critical approach to the visual arts, decorative arts and architecture, directly connected to diverse cultures of collecting and presenting art. Our teaching and research are enhanced by collaborative partnerships with museums, heritage institutions…

The MA programme in Museum Studies is unique in upholding a critical approach to the visual arts, decorative arts and architecture, directly connected to diverse cultures of collecting and presenting art. Our teaching and research are enhanced by collaborative partnerships with museums, heritage institutions…

The MA programme in Art History is unique in upholding a critical approach to the visual arts, decorative arts and architecture, directly connected to diverse cultures of collecting and presenting art. Our teaching and research are enhanced by collaborative partnerships with museums, heritage institutions…

The MA programme in Museum Studies is unique in upholding a critical approach to the visual arts, decorative arts and architecture, directly connected to diverse cultures of collecting and presenting art. Our teaching and research are enhanced by collaborative partnerships with museums, heritage institutions…

Why did 'character', 'habit', and 'virtue' serve as key terms in late 19th and early 20th-century scholarly correspondences, biographies, and obituaries? Why did scholars around 1900 display so much interest in the working habits and character traits of what they called the 'scholarly self'?

Leiden University is famous for its library’s large collection of Oriental manuscripts. Part of this collection is a group of 104 Arabic documents written on papyrus and paper (Or. 8264 and 12885). These documents date from the 7th through 10th century CE and cover a wide range of subjects (private…

In 'Dutch Atlantic Connections, 1680-1800', Gert Oostindie and Jessica V. Roitman, both of the Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV) and also affiliated with the History Institute of Leiden University, assemble an internationally acclaimed selection of authors,…

If idioms employed in codes of conduct could be as idiosyncratic as examples suggest, then to what extent did early modern language of vice, too, persist in this genre?

The Khoesan were the first people in Africa to undergo the full rigours of European colonisation. By the early nineteenth century, they had largely been brought under colonial rule, dispossessed of their land and stock, and forced to work as labourers for farmers of European descent.

This volume, featuring sixteen contributions from leading Roman historians and archaeologists, sheds new light on approaches to the economic history of urban craftsmen and traders in the Roman world, with a particular emphasis on the imperial period.

Situated at the crossroads of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the Spanish Philippines offer historians an intriguing middle ground of connected histories that raises fundamental new questions about conventional ethnic, regional and religious identities.

The Encyclopedia of Global Human Migration provides a complete exploration of the prominent themes, events, and theoretical underpinnings of the movements of human populations from prehistory to the present day.

The Historic Port Town of Sandy Point and its Anchorage

Aristocratic dynasties have long been regarded as fundamental to the development of early modern society and government. Yet recent work by political historians has increasingly questioned the dominant role of ruling families in state formation, underlining instead the continued importance and independence…

A defining fixture of our contemporary world, video games offer a rich spectrum of engagements with the past.

Investigation of 1.) The whereabouts of the epistemological dissonances in art criticisms on Post-war contemporary art from Japan between two different language realms, in this case in English and Japanese; and 2.) What the dissonances disclose, disturb, and contribute in the process of the establishment…

Arab Identity and the Rise of Islam

The edited volume 'Arabic in context: celebrating 400 years of Arabic at Leiden University' edited by Ahmad Al-Jallad is out. The volume contains the contributions to the 2013 conference with the same title, held at Leiden University and was published as part of Brill's the Studies in Semitics Language…

What was the stringed instrument known in medieval and early Renaissance Italy as “cetra”?

The chaotic years after the Civil War are often seen as a time of uniquely American idealism—a revolutionary attempt to rebuild the nation that paved the way for the civil rights movement of the twentieth century. But Adam Fairclough rejects this prevailing view, challenging prominent historians such…

On the 11th of June, Umberto Selva successfully defended his doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Umberto on this great result.

How was FDR's image constructed—by himself and others—as such a powerful icon in American memory?

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.

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

This volume offers an innovative analysis of Roman political culture in Italy from the first to the sixth century AD on the basis of seven case studies.

Interested in studying Ancient History at Leiden University? Find out what our alumni said about this master's programme.

Whether implicitly or explicitly, we all have ideas about how the law is supposed to function, whose interests it should represent, and what role it should play in society. This project explores the ways in which these questions are addressed in the works of the Roman historian Publius Cornelius Tacitus…

Lecture, Global Histories of Knowledge Seminar

In this book chapter, Andrea Malaya M. Ragragio and Myfel D. Paluga unpack the indigenous category

This lecture will be hosted on Thursday, 14 November 2024 at 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm.

This centre brings together the research of the members of the Institute of Philosophy and affiliated academics whose work focuses on the history of philosophy broadly conceived. Research interests range from ancient to near-contemporary philosophy in various regions of the world, and cover all subdisciplines…

Lodewijk Petram, author of the book 'The World's First Stock Exchange', discussed the rise of the Amsterdam stock exchange in the 17th century in the ninth Hazelhoff Guest Lecture.

One way for governments to conduct foreign policy and promote national interests is through direct outreach and communication with the population of a foreign country. This is called public diplomacy. Historians such as Helmer Helmers and William T. Rossiter have shown that printed media were already…

The Persian Empire (539-330 BCE) was the first world empire in history. At its height, it united a territory stretching from present-day India to Libya - and it would take 2,000 years before significantly larger empires emerged in early modern Eurasia. Its size and power was revered by some, feared…

How did British scholars and scientists in the period of discipline formation envision, experience and resist scholarly temptations?

The 'Leids Papyrologisch Instituut' is one of the few institutes worldwide that studies both Greek (and Latin) and Demotic and Abnormal-Hieratic papyri.

There are various links between Rembrandt and Leiden University

A comparative study on the spatial origin and development of towns in the northern Netherlands, 700-1400.