In Reframing the Diplomat Albertine Bloemendal offers a unique window onto the unofficial dimension of Cold War transatlantic relations by analyzing the diplomatic role of the Dutch Atlanticist Ernst van der Beugel as a government official and as a private diplomat.

In White Lies and Black Markets, Fatah-Black offers a new account of the colonization of Suriname—one of the major European plantation colonies on the Guiana Coast—in the period between 1650-1800.

This book investigates how the rulers of the Habsburg world empire developed and implemented a central maritime policy for the Netherlands and appointed an admiral of the sea or admiral-general for that purpose.

This book argues that the combined literary, epigraphic and archaeological evidence supports the theory that early-imperial Italy had about six million inhabitants.

During the early modern period, many medieval manuscripts were cut up into strips of parchment which were reused to reinforce the bindings of newly printed books. Until recently, these reused pieces of medieval manuscripts only came to light when the early modern book binding was damaged and/or subjected…

This volume was edited by Jeroen Duindam, Jill Harries, Caroline Humfress, and Nimrod Hurvitz.

The process of unification and the character of the union are the central topics of Magnanimous Dukes and Rising States. Robert Stein mirrors continuity and modernisation in Burgundian times with the bankruptcy of the former dynasties and the decline of feudal government. The powerful towns played an…

Vijf jaar na de overhandiging van ‘A History of Russian Law’, overhandigde emiritus hoogleraar Ferdinand Feldbrugge op 16 januari het tweede deel van zijn unieke overzichtswerk aan decaan van de Faculteit der Rechtsgeleerdheid Joanne van der Leun.

The central aims of this project are to establish the shapes of the various urban hierarchies existing in the provinces of the Roman Empire and (especially) to use the quantitative properties of these hierarchies to shed new light on levels of economic integration.

The Yearbook for Dutch Book History publishes Open Access articles in the Dutch and English language on all aspects of the book history of the Low Countries. For the 32nd edition of 2025, they particularly welcome contributions within the theme of “Books across borders.”

The Dutch Research School Art History (OSK) and Utrecht University organize the Technical Art History Days. On April 4 and 5, experts present and discuss current research at Utrecht University that brings together material and digital approaches for the study of art and heritage.

Blood, Sweat and Tears: The Changing Concepts of Physiology from Antiquity into Early Modern Europe

The Leiden wall formulae, Einstein's sink or the signature wall of Ehrenfest. It are just a few of Leiden's hidden science treasures. Alumnus from the Leiden Observatory Alex Pietrow described a few of these places on travel website Atlas Obscura.

The Department of History at Amherst College invites applications for a full-time, tenure-track position at the rank of assistant professor in medieval and early modern European history, beginning July 1, 2024. The area of specialization is open, but we particularly seek candidates who will offer a…

The Yearbook for Dutch Book History publishes Dutch and English articles on the book history of the Low Countries, in all time periods (including the Middle Ages). For the 30th Yearbook, to be published in 2023, they welcome in particular contributions for the theme ‘Technology and Transformation’.…

The aim of this project is to study the influence of Longinus’s treatise ‘On the sublime’ on practice and theory of architecture and theatre in seventeenth-century Paris and Amsterdam.

This NWO-funded research programme focuses on the assumptions and methodology of the writing of history of science. History of science is in many respects a flourishing discipline: it currently yields an impressive volume of studies. Systematic reflection about the ways in which history of science may…

Arab Identity and the Rise of Islam

The Tides of History is a history podcast that takes listeners into the past while trying to identify how it echoes today. The current season centers around the Iron Age and the new episode features an interview with our own Bleda Düring.

Leidens's Classics and History rank 6th and 15th place in the QS World University Rankings by Subject. Every year, QS ranks universities all over the world on academic reputation and research impact, grouped by subject. Linguistics (23), Languages (39) and Religious Studies (40) also do well in the…

This research project focuses on the thoughts of ethnicity and political orthodoxy in Medieval China by investigating Wang Tong’s works.

On the 2nd of September Jiyan Qiao successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

French title: Communication et violences dans le Guéra et le Moyen-Chari (Tchad) de 1940 à 2010. This research investigates the relationship between the introduction of new means of communication and violence experienced by the local populations in the Moyen-Chari and the Guéra regions in Chad from…

Nadine Akkerman recently appeared as a guest on a BBC podcast and the History Extra podcast to discuss her book Spycraft. In these interviews, she delved into the fascinating world of espionage, sharing insights from her research and highlighting key themes from her work.

Carmen Gonsalves has been the Dutch ambassador to Chile since this autumn. She studied history in Leiden. How useful has her degree been and what’s it like to be an ambassador? ‘Diplomacy is fascinating.’ We spoke to her just before the presidential elections.

This study employs a comparative perspective to identify generic and specific qualities of petitions and petitioning. It charts the chronological development of petitioning practices over centuries. The interdisciplinary approaches provide range of conceptual and methodological expertise for reade…

The Secret Life of Art Works. Exploring the Boundaries between Art and Life is the first collection of essays to present case studies from the visual arts, architecture, sculpture and numismatics, and to engage critically with theoretical perspectives from art history, psychology, aesthetics and ant…

Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, the city of Batavia was supplied with produce by its hinterland, known as the Ommelanden. Bondan Kanumoyoso studied the history of the various ethnic groups that populated this area and in doing so has shed light on the structure of modern-day Indonesian society.…

The Chinese History chair has a long, rich history within Leiden University. Since 1 February, this position has been held by Ying Zhang. ‘Leiden University brings together a legendary range of Asian knowledge.’

How did disability become a global concern? In this project we will identify the contribution of international agencies, governmental and non-governmental organizations and, just as importantly, disabled people themselves, to the IYDP and by showing the connections, interactions and entanglements between…

The book on Turkey. A Modern History written by Professor Erik-Jan Zürcher, Professor of Turkish Studies, is now available in nine different languages. Arabic and Polish versions have now been published.

Elsemieke Daalder has won the prestigious ‘Premio della Corte costituzionale italiana’, part of the ‘Premio Boulvert’ awards, for her dissertation ‘De rechtspraakverzamelingen van Julius Paulus’, for which she was awarded her doctorate cum laude on 23 October 2018 in Leiden.

The University of Lausanne is hiring 2 PhD's in the domain of art history and French literature. Projects have a specific focus on North West Europe. Candidates should apply before May 1st, 2024.

Lise Stork, PhD candidate at LIACS, was interviewed by Mare about how to smartly digitise the collections of natural history museums.

‘Islam and Muslims are not something that happened to Europe; they are part of Europe. In fact, Islam is one the biggest constants in European history,’ argues Professor Maurits Berger in the new eight-part History of Islam in Europe podcast series of the Leiden University Faculty of Humanities.

The rise and fall of the cesspit in an urban context

The aim of the project is to contribute to the process of archive formation ongoing in Post-Apartheid South Africa through the inclusion of photographs that have been either unacknowledged or excised from the national canon.

The historical archaeology of the Port of Sandy Point and its anchorage, St. Kitts, West Indies

The ESSHC is coming to Leiden (Wednesday 18 - Saturday 21 March 2020)! The European Social Science History Conference is one of the largest gatherings of historians in Europe. The next conference will be held in Leiden in 2020. We are very happy that Leiden has been chosen to host this conference.…

Van 21 augustus tot en met 8 september zijn de workshops en cursus van de jaarlijkse Summer School on the History of the Book van het Allard Pierson en de vakgroep Boekwetenschap. Drie weken lang is er elke werkdag een cursus, workshop of lezing over thema’s die te maken hebben met de geschiedenis van…

What is the significance of the history of slavery for our present-day society? A special exhibition in the inner courtyard of the Academy Building features eleven insightful portraits of students and staff, and their answer to this question. The aim of the exhibition’s initiators is to make the subject…

Different groups can have different memories of the same historical event. This can lead to conflict but does not have to. How is this, and how can countries and people reconcile with the past?

What can we learn from how maritime conflicts were managed in the past? What significance did Maritime Conflict Management have in shaping the standards of diplomacy and international law in pre-modern Atlantic Europe (1200-1600)?

The journey of sugar from east to west

Minims are letters that are made up of short, vertical pen strokes, such as 'm', 'i', 'n' and 'u'. In Gothic script, there is often little distinction between letters composed of minims. Assistant professor of medieval literature Krista Murchison has written an article in History Today on the hidden…

The treasure houses of Leiden's University Library and Naturalis house wonderful historical collections with dried plants and botanical drawings. Tinde van Andel, extraordinary professor of History of botany and gardens, studies these collections.

Leiden alumnus Makoto Yoshida from Japan studied Dutch history and politics from 1996 to 1997. Now he is back in Leiden with his wife who is currently a student at the Faculty of Humanities. Some things still surprise him. 'Everyone at university uses first names, which was - and still is - unacceptable…

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…

On February 2nd the book Beelden zonder weerga appears, written by professor in science history Dirk van Delft and biochemist Ton van Helvoort. They describe the rich history of electron microscopy, which comes to a conclusion in the final chapter with the current state-of-the-art ESCHER microscope…