LIAS aims to advance the globally conscious vision of area studies, both within and outside the academic community. Focusing on Asia and the Middle East, the institute is a meeting place of multiple fields of inquiry, theories and methods, historical periods, and areas.

In this course, we will focus on the fascinating history of the Arabic Medieval World. We will take you on a journey through the Middle Ages. All along, we will present you with historiographical debates and dilemmas and travel back and forth in time explaining to you how events of the past affected…

Religion in the ancient world, and ancient Egyptian religion in particular, is often perceived as static, hierarchically organised, and centred on priests, tombs, and temples. Engagement with archaeological and textual evidence dispels these beguiling if superficial narratives, however. Individuals…

Abrupt Climate Change and Cultural Transformation

The times between the Neolithic and Urban revolutions in Mesopotamia have for a long time been interpreted as a period of stagnation. This volume is part of an emerging discourse that challenges such assumptions.

This book is the first grammar on Ternate Malay, a local variety of Malay spoken on the island of Ternate, North-Moluccas, Indonesia.

On February 28th, Promise Dodzi Kpoglu succesfully defended his doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Dodzi on this great result.

Commagene in its Local, Regional and Global Hellenistic Context

This dissertation provides an overview of the phonological developments of the Qinghai-Gansu languages, comparing them to the reconstructed ancestral language.

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…

On the 4th of June, Andreas Joswig successfully defended his doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Andreas on this great result.

This book provides a grammatical sketch, glossed texts and a glossary of Tarifiyt Berber, which is the main heritage language of the Moroccan community in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.

This project consists of various case studies.

The Uses of Justice in Global Perspective, 1600–1900 presents a new perspective on the uses of justice between 1600 and 1900 and confronts prevailing Eurocentric historiography in its examination of how people of this period made use of the law.

On the 16th of February, Yunus Sulistyono successfully defended a doctoral thesis. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Yunus on this achievement!

In this paper, the authors study how individual and country-level variables interact in affecting political gender attitudes in Europe.

The Leiden University Institute for History has a wide-ranging academic scope unique for the Netherlands. This is directly reflected in the participation of her staff in various Master's and Bachelor's programmes at Leiden University.

Promotores: G. Persoon, R. Schefold

The production, use, and exchange of bodily ornaments through the lenses of the microscope

On the 29th of June, Martin Kohlberger successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Martin on this achievement!

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

On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the magna carta of civil aviation, the Convention on International Civil Aviation (Chicago Convention 1944), Professor Steven Truxal has written a leading piece for the European Civil Aviation Conference: The Chicago system: a steadfast legal blueprint for…

For a long time it has been thought that habitation and landscape organisation only changed significantly from the Roman Period onwards. However, many developments were already started long before Julius Caesar's Roman armies arrived in the southern Netherlands.

This monograph by Robert Ross provides a detailed narrative of the Kat River Settlement in the Eastern Cape of South Africa during the nineteenth century.

This research combines archaeological, archaeometric and ethnohistorical research to study the organisation of settlement space and residence rules among the Taino Indians during the Late Ceramic Age (AD 1000-1492).

A Jurist's Travelogue

The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) has awarded Veni funding to four Humanities researchers in at Leiden University. This award offers promising young scientists the opportunity to develop their own ideas over a period of three years.

Egyptian artist Bahia Shebab will give a masterclass in Leiden on 13 December. She is one of this year's laureates of the Prins Claus Award and has become known for her subversive graffiti. Judith Naeff, lecturer in Cultures of the Middle East, introduces Shebab and calls on students to register for…

This summer, the COBRA Museum will be focusing on Moroccan art. 'The other story' exhibition presents for the first time Moroccan modernism in the Netherlands. The Netherlands Institute Morocco (NIMAR) contributed to its exhibition

Archives were a common target during the Second World War, and hundreds suffered damages. Among these archival losses, the losses to medieval manuscript collections stand out.

The programme consists of four fields of study which are outlined below.

Get to know us through our online and in-person events for prospective students!

To what extent is creative ownership in contemporary (graphic) design practices changing now that we are co-creating with machines? And can machines have copyrights, too?

The project ‘Diversifying Ancient History’, sponsored by the JEDI Fund from the Faculty of Humanities, aims to thoroughly revise the first-year curriculum of Ancient History. Through these innovations, the course will cater the needs of the present generation.

The Dutch Center for Travel Writing Studies s a scientific center that develops and coordinates initiatives to promote research into travel writing. It actively seeks contact with external (scientific and social) partners to collaborate on issues surrounding cultural / national identity, cultural contact…

This publication of the School of Advanced Study of the University of London is one of the outcomes of the Landscapes of Early Roman Colonization project and the Colonial Rural Networks project (NWO, Dr. T.D. Stek). The volume, edited by Tesse Stek and prof. Gert-Jan Burgers of the Free University Amsterdam,…

Dialogue is a multi-dimensional communication mechanism whose processes can only be examined by means of an interdisciplinary approach.

Staging the Archive: Art and Photography in the Age of New Media is dedicated to art practices that mobilize the model of the archive, demonstrating the ways in which such archival artworks probe the possibilities of what art is and what it can do.

This collaborative research group (CRG) facilitates the synergies of researchers engaged with African languages and documentation of texts conducted in East Africa, paying particular attention to ‘endangered archives’ and ‘endangered languages’.

The complexities of modernization in Brazil and Graciliano Ramos significance for our understanding of Brazil today.

On 1 September 2022 Afke van Ewijk successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

The study of language in change.

This project studies the theory and practice of moral education in the (Neo)Platonic tradition.

Explores the relationship between technics and humanity, tracing the emergence of a bio-technical conception of existence in contemporary continental philosophy. Suny Press

In what ways can visual art play a vital role in countering the discriminating stigma experienced by transgender communities?

A core interest of our cluster members concerns processes of reception, transformation and (interlingual and intermedial) translation in medieval and early modern art, literature and media from diachronic and synchronic perspectives (in time, space, and between media).

The Leiden Institute of History approaches early modern and modern European history from comparative and transnational perspectives.

LUC hosts many opportunities for students to join activities during their study. Within the college, there are numerous initiatives that you can choose from and if it doesn't exist yet, try making it yourself!