Who is Economic Man? Every economic paradigm presupposes an anthropology, a theory of human nature. This project explores the anthropologies presupposed and produced by ancient Greek economic texts, and the specific knowledge forms that shape these anthropologies.

Wietse Stam is a PhD candidate at the Leiden University Institute for History. His PhD thesis is about UNTAC; a United Nations peacekeeping operation in Cambodia during the early 1990s.

The aim of this project is to foster a historiography that does justice both to the realization that scientific knowledge is constructed by local, contingent, and contextual processes, and the claims of science to objective validity.

Interview with Pieter Slaman who received the LUS Education Prize. What makes the award so special to him and does he already know how he will use his prize money?

Colonialism Inside Out: Everyday Experience and Plural Practice in Dutch Institutions in Sri Lanka (c. 1700-1800)

Faculty of Humanities, Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS) and the Leiden University Institute for History (LUIH) are looking for a PhD in the History and Culture of Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity.

LeidenGlobal Annual event

This project investigates the full ecosystem of Middle Dutch prayerbooks in order to answer questions about their role in – and impact on – religion, culture, and society in the late medieval Low Countries.

This project looks at the ways in which youth in southern Nigeria navigate their lives in a context of experiencing long-term socioeconomic uncertainty and political insecurity (duress).

From memorials to the armed forces to memory stones for individual victims. It was only later that the Holocaust took a central role in Western remembrance culture, Cleveringa Professor Frank van Vree notes. ‘Nationalists and human rights activists both invoke the experience of the Holocaust.’

In February 2015 Lauren Lauret started her PhD project titled 'Meeting practices of the Dutch States General and the continuity of the early modern world of the political (1780-1848)' at the Institute for History, supervised by prof. H. te Velde.

This dissertation the role of the English dissenting minister Joseph Priestley (1733-1804) as a grammarian is studied.

Muhammad Adlin Sila examines the range of ways Bima Muslims constitute their Islamic identities and agencies through rituals and festivals. In response to their surroundings, what it means to be a Muslim is constantly being negotiated.

On Tuesday 30 April 2024 Jonny Russell successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

This monograph, written by dr. Dennie Oude Nijhuis and published by Cambridge University Press, discusses the postwar development of the welfare state.

The Dutch and English East India Companies were formidable organizations that were gifted with expansive powers that allowed them to conduct diplomacy, wage war and seize territorial possessions. But they did not move into an empty arena in which they were free to deploy these powers without resista…

This study offers a new view on public services in the early modern Low Countries and answers the following questions: who provided public facilities in urban communities and in which ways did public amenities change in the period between 1500 and 1800?

This dissertation examines how Benedictine monks at the Abbey of Fécamp designed, produced, and read books over the course of the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

On 1 July – Keti Koti, in the year ahead, our university community will be able to reflect extensively on the history of slavery by engaging in research, education and many other activities.

Book historian Erik Kwakkel found an intriguing snippet of text earlier this week, that bears unexpected evidence of some of the problems encoutered by early printers: censorship and the affiliated fuss of seeking and printing Church approval.

In recent years, the public discourse on immigration in Europe and in the United States has often focused on efforts to increase security and restrict traffic on external borders. How old is this phenomenon of states attempting to control migrations on external borders? What were the motives and the…

For many teachers, they are a lifesaver: the people at the Science Teacher Support Desk. When a teacher has technical problems, they come to the rescue immediately. Veerle Warnders is one of them and she tells us what is so great about her job.

In Harper’s Magazine, reviewer Dan Piepenbring discusses the latest book by professor Nadine Akkerman and Pete Langman. ‘Spycraft’ showcases how and why messages were ciphered in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England.

After the advent of Islam in the 7th century C.E., the strategic geographical position of Tarsus (its proximity to the sea and to the mountain pass leading to inland Anatolia) made this town the de facto capital of the thughur, a historical and geographical term created by Muslim geographers qualifying…

Indonesian Law and Reality in the Mahakam Delta

Classical statistical methods, such as p-values, are difficult for researchers to apply correctly. They for example do not allow drawing conclusions from a study early, or for extending a study with extra research groups that want to make their data available later.

The physical features of twelfth-century manuscripts from the Flemish abbey of Ter Duinen – such as script, page layout, and reading aids – show how their readers organized, interpreted, and transmitted knowledge.

Francoise Baggeler started her PhD at the Institute for History on 1st of september 2011.

Hasan Colak is one of the two postdocs in Cátia Antunes’ ERC Research Project 'Fighting Monopolies'.

In January 2014, Irial Glynn started a two-year Marie Curie Fellowship in Leiden. His project will compare the migration experiences of Ireland and Italy since 1945.

Americans are electing a new president in November but they also have other choices to make in the polling booth. Alumnus Sanne Rijkhoff works at a Texas university and is trying to help make students more aware of the elections.

In August 2014 Stefano Bellucci started working as Senior Lecturer in African History at the Institute for History.

Erik Odegard is the third PhD-student who's joining Cátia Antunes' 'Challenging Monopolies' project.

Primate and test specialist Jane Goodall paid a visit to the Hortus botanicus in Leiden on 21 May for a ‘meet & greet’. Goodall, a world-famous researcher and nature protectionist, was presented with an orchid named after her and used the occasion to draw attention to the issue of plant protection.…

Margarida Borges has been working as a PhD candidate at the Leiden Institute for History since September 2011.

Lecture, Studium Generale

During his visit on 12 April 2016, Dr. Jatna Supriatna was appointed as visiting scholar at the Faculty of Science of the Universiteit Leiden. Dr. Supriatna is a biologist, and is a senior lecturer at Universitas Indonesia’s Department of Biology. His appointment was made in the context of increasing…

The History programme has been working for several years to make the curriculum more diverse and inclusive. With a Comenius grant, university lecturer Kim Beerden wants to take the next step.

Innovation in nest building: bird nests made from anti-bird spikes. Researchers from Naturalis Biodiversity Center and the Natural History Museum Rotterdam describe this behaviour in a publication.

In January 2014, I began working as a postdoctoral researcher in History at Leiden on the NWO project “Democratization and political terrorism: The formation and destruction of the two-party system in the Red River Valley of Louisiana, 1865-1878,” where I am studying with Professor Adam Fairclough.

Let’s get this out of the way: Hillary Clinton won the 26 September 2016 presidential candidates television debate. Handily.

Donald Trump's US election victory is causing major concerns in many countries, including Iran. Afshin Ellian, Professor of Jurisprudence, spoke about this on Dutch all-news radio station BNR: ‘Denying that they're worried is really just for show’.

French title: Entre la “détresse’’ et l’inter-connectivite : le case de Mbororo réfugies sur les frontières Cameroun-Centrafrique. This research project investigates the meaning of duress in the lives of nomadic refugees in Cameroon and investigates if and how the accessibility of new ICT’s allow them…

When did the Mali Empire disintegrate? What does the Sunjata heritage demonstrate about the political situation after 1600?

Cambridge History of South Africa, volume 1: From early times to 1885 (edited by Carolyn Hamilton, Bernard K. Mbenga, and Robert Ross) made Choice magazine's list of Outstanding Academic Titles for 2010.

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.