The special collections of Leiden University Libraries offer access to worldwide known valuable, rare, and unique materials. The collections are actively complemented and made accessible for research and education.

As soon as your thesis has been approved, you will be asked to upload your final version to the Student Repository. The Repository is an online archive for Leiden University theses. You can send all questions regarding your upload to the repository to your Education administration office.

Check whether you may incorporate journal articles in readers (via ReaderOnline) or place these articles on Brightspace, without having to pay costs via the Easy Access Agreement (also referred to as Reader Agreement).

Leiden University Libraries hosts materials in hundreds of different languages, including many languages that are written in non-Latin scripts.

Copyright is important when writing, publishing or (re-)using academic publications. The Copyright Information Office helps Leiden University staff with copyright related questions.

Library

This Subject Guide is designed to support students of Korean studies at Leiden University in their research process. For every step of the research process, this guide introduces a number of tips and recommended resources. You can find several sub-guides and contacts in the 'quick links' in the tab…

A collection consists of items and parts that have been collected by one or more individuals or institutions not responsible for their formation. An archive has been created by one or more individuals or institutions.

Leiden University Libraries hosts materials in hundreds of different languages, including many languages that are written in non-Latin scripts. Since 2015, all items are catalogued in the original scripts. Therefore, you may use for instance Arabic, Persian, Russian, Hebrew, Japanese, Korean or Chinese…

The Centre for Digital Scholarship offers several opportunities for training on data management. Topics included are policies and requirements, sensitive data and GDPR, data sharing and consent, publishing and archiving data, Data Management Plans, FAIR data (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and…

Scholarly Publications is a sustainable archive for Leiden University’s publications, which researchers themselves can make Open Access by means of an upload via LUCRIS.

Leiden researchers are entitled to take part in deals regarding Open Access that have been arranged with a substantial number of publishers.

The national demonstration against higher education cuts on 14 November in Utrecht will not go ahead. Utrecht Mayor Dijksma has advised the organisers to cancel the protest. The Utrecht 'triangle' (mayor, police and Public Prosecution Service) says it has received information that pro-Palestinian demonstrators…

The Chinese Special Collections are part of the Asian Library. Items can be consulted at the Special Collections Reading Room.

Symposium

In short, data management can be defined as the creation, storage, maintenance, disclosure, archiving and sustainable preservation of research data. Increasingly the so called FAIR principles are referred to as a final goal: data should be made 'Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Re-usable'.

The University Library's Open Science services are available to individual researchers as well as on the level of the University's faculties and institutes.

The special collections from Japan and Korea are located at the central library building at Witte Singel, where it forms a part of the Asian Library.

The Middle Eastern Special Collections form the nucleus of the entire range of Oriental heritage collections of Leiden University Libraries.

As a Friend, you contribute to the acquisition, digitisation and restoration of important objects.

Library staff will select, acquire, catalogue and manage materials to support teaching, learning and research at Leiden University. We aim to have all required study literature available online or in print at the beginning of the semester. Do you think that some titles are missing? Contact your…

Research

Overview of databases, reference works and website for research in the History of Science

Brightspace is the electronic learning environment of Leiden University.

The Leiden University Libraries (UBL) catalogue contains millions of (e-)books, (e-)journals, manuscripts, letters, and other materials available at the UBL.

Freedom is not something we can take for granted. In its thematic programme ‘Oppression and Freedom’, Leiden University Libraries (UBL) has explored views on identity, relations and the interaction between individuals and groups in the past. The programme included several (online) exhibitions, workshops…

Anyone wishing to make a substantial contribution to Leiden University Libraries can have the donation earmarked for a specific purpose. You can set up this fund to support a specific collection or research area. These so-called Named Funds are therefore always customized. It is also possible to donate…

The fellowship programs support researchers who are interested in doing research using the special collections.

Leiden University Libraries (UBL) participates in international interlibrary loan services (ILL) and document delivery for libraries worldwide.

Leiden University owns an extensive collection of papyri. The Papyrological Institute is proprietor of most of this collection. A smaller amount of Papyri is part of the ULL collection. Apart from original papyri the Papyrological Institute offers an extensive collection of handbooks and secondary studies…

UBL's collection exists to a large extent thanks to donations and financial support from private donors and funds.

Uniquely within the Netherlands, Leiden University Library also collects objects to document the technical development of photography. Hundreds of historical cameras are part of the colletion, as well as darkroom and finishing equipment (light meters, developing trays, color filters, drying racks, etcetera),…

The composition and maintenance of Research Software is an increasingly important task in the development of research projects.

In short, data management can be defined as the creation, storage, maintenance, disclosure, archiving and sustainable preservation of research data.

The Centre for Digital Scholarship (CDS) supports Open Science by providing information, consultancy, and training on the following topics.

Overview of databases, reference works and websites for research in Chinese Studies

This Subject Guide is designed to support students of Japan studies at Leiden University in their research process. For every step of the research process, this guide introduces a number of tips and recommended resources. You can find several sub-guides and contacts in the 'quick links' in the tab on…

Overview of databases, reference works and websites for research in Middle Eastern Studies

There are several excellent options for teachers and researchers to engage students and other audiences with primary sources. Either by requesting items from the Special Collections for use during lectures or by integrating our educational resources into your lesson plans.

At the moment a lot of discussion surrounds ChatGPT, an advanced chatbot which uses Artificial Intelligence (AI). ChatGPT is based on a Large Language Model (LLM) and has been trained using an enormous amount of text, providing it with knowledge of grammar, semantics and contextual nuances. The program…

Overview of databases, reference works and websites for research in Caribbean Studies

The Student Repository is part of Scholarly Publications Leiden University and offers an online archive that makes Bachelor and Master theses easily searchable and publicly available.

Everyone working with research data will, at some point, come across the acronym of FAIR, which stands for Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable.

Text and Data Mining (TDM) is increasingly applied in various academic disciplines to extract useful information from unstructured textual data using computational methods.

The Centre for Digital Scholarship offers training, events and presentations for members of Leiden University on the many different aspects of digital scholarship.

The collection Prints, Drawings and Portraits comprises over 100,000 prints, 12,000 drawings and 30,000 portraits.

The collections of drawings consists of around 12,000 drawings of mostly Dutch origin, dating from 1500 until now. The collections is the result of some major purchases, such as the collections of Albertus Welcker (1957) and Adolphus Staring (1969). Almost every Dutch artist is represented with a single…

Brightspace will fully replace Blackboard in academic year 2020-2021. Following evaluations of students and lecturers’ first impressions of Brightspace, the project team now plans to make this digital learning environment more user-friendly.