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)?

Book Launch

Watch and talk along with today’s science of the past during weekly Let’s Plays of popular games and vodcasts on the livestream platform Twitch.

Sarah Cramsey was appointed professor by special appointment of Central European Studies at the Institute of History on 14 September. 'I am keen to incorporate different scholarly approaches into my work and raise the profile of Central European Studies in Leiden.'

The subject of this thesis is Alverata, a twenty-first-century typeface whose design was inspired by the shapes of Romanesque capitals such as those found in inscriptions of the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

The Turn of the Soul: Representations of Religious Conversion in Early Modern Art and Literature

Modern Japanese culture can best be described in one word: cute. Hello Kitty, the most important symbol of cuteness, can be found in all layers of society. Leiden Japanologists Ivo Smits and Kasia Cwiertka put together a volume of articles on this curious phenomenon.

Bahar Şimşek defended her thesis on 4 May 2021.

The NWO-funded research project ‘The Multilingual Dynamics of the Literary Culture of Medieval Flanders, c. 1200- c. 1500’ is hosting a series of e-workshops on the topic of ‘Multilingual Literary Cultures in the Middle Ages’. The program is now available online.

Asim Zubcevic defended his thesis on 11 November 2015

Arab Identity and the Rise of Islam

The University of Limerick (Ierland) is looking for a postdoctoral researcher to explore aspects of nonconformity and deviance in the early modern world of learning. Deadline for proposals: May 11.

Five research projects of the Institute for History have been selected for the Research Traineeship Programme 2016-2017. The programme was initiated by The Faculty of Humanities to offer motivated students the opportunity to develop themselves in academic research. In December the research trainees,…

On 27 November the official opening of LeidenGlobal will be celebrated in the Rijksmuseum Volkenkunde/National Museum of Ethnology. LeidenGlobal is a platform for global expertise that responds to the call from Minister of Education and Culture Jet Bussemakers that academic and cultural institutions…

This proposed research uses ego-documents from visual artists that were not intended for publication to reassess the scholarly debate on the demise of the Russian Avant-garde aesthetic in the twenties and early thirties of the 20th century.

Het Departement Architectuur (Faculteit Ingenieurswetenschappen, Campus Heverlee KU Leuven), zoekt kandidaten voor het project: “Verloren middeleeuwse forten in de Lage Landen ontsloten in 3D”. Het betreft een volledig gefinancierde doctoraatsbeurs in het veld van de architectuurgeschiedenis. Deadline…

The ERC-project CaPANES (Causal Pattern Analysis of Economic Sovereignty) is looking for a postdoctoral researcher and two PhD's. This project addresses economic sovereignty of commercial cities in the period of c. 1400-c. 1620. Deadline for applications: November 4.

In Europe a number of production and communication strategies have long tried to establish local products as resources for local development. At the foot of the Alps, this scenario appears in all its contradictions, especially in relation to cheese production. The Heritage Arena focuses on the saga…

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…

The fourth edition of the Middle Eastern Culture market was a great success with more than 2000 visitors over the weekend. Attendees participated in the many workshops, attended lectures, and shopped at the market stands.

The University of Groningen is looking for an assistant professor in Medieval history for 1,0 FTE. Deadline for applications, 23 March 2025.

How were Spanish commanders fighting in the Low Countries between 1567 and 1577 portrayed in Spanish and Dutch narrative sources during the Eighty Years War?

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…

Of jars and gongs deals with the traditional ritual art of Ot Danum Dayak subsistence farmers from a stretch of tropical rainforest in the heart of Borneo. Together with the Ngaju, their neighbours to the south, they gloried in one of the most elaborate secondary mortuary rites in the world.

How do first-hand narratives of war of commanders in the front line relate to the official narrative of the Eighty Years’ War?

Alumna Lauren Antonides has won the Roggeveen Prize for her thesis on the regional identity of Zeelandic Flanders. She will receive a sum of 1,000 euros.

This PhD project investigates the forms, functions, meanings, and socio-cultural values embedded in Palenda, in order to understand how it reflects and shapes the worldview of the Muna people (Mieno Wuna) through metaphor.

The contributions in this volume seek to highlight the atypical features of the Hanse, and place them in a wider context of common roots, influences and parallel developments.

This pilot project will initiate research on how heritage has been and can be mobilized to address climate change governance in Himalayan Asia. Climate adaptation strategies frequently include the sourcing of heritage, encompassing landscapes, built environments 4 and cultural practices. However, effective…

Anja Groten contributes the essay 'The Workshop and Cultural Production' to Amsterdam-based publication platform 'Open!'

This project explores themes at the intersection of maritime history and environmental history by looking at the problems Dutch ships encountered in the different climates of the Atlantic and Indian Ocean worlds, and the solutions they could provide.

Ongoing microwear analysis of the flint artefacts from the Funnelbeaker period suggests that flint had a pivotal role in the representation and structuration of the cosmological order of Funnelbeaker society.

Leiden University will continue to offer its BA in Italian Language and Culture. The Board of the Faculty of Humanities has reversed its decision to stop admitting new students as of the 2026/2027 academic year.

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…

On Monday 9 May, IIASL alumnus Adrian Young gave a very satisfying cross-disciplinary session between law and the arts, on the preservation of heritage in space.

In this article, Ben de Jong, research fellow at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs, examines the relationship between double agents and their handlers.

In what way is constructivist logic able to account for both the role of the judging agent in inference and the universal claims of logical validity?

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.

International Coalitions for Peace in the Era of Decolonization, 1918-1970

The Institute for History of Leiden University, in collaboration with the N.W. Posthumus Institute, is organising a Masterclass by Dr. Arthur Weststeijn on Friday 13 November 2015.

The fifth volume of Ex Novo has the pleasure to host Flaminia Bartolini as guest editor for the special issue titled Heritage in the Making. Dealing with Legacies of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. This collection of peer-reviewed papers stems in part from the successful workshop held at McDonald Institute…

This research investigates the impact of socioeconomic developments on the physical condition of medieval populations in Holland and Zeeland between AD 1000 and 1600 through the analysis of human skeletal remains from three archaeological sites.