Numerous beads and pendants of amber, jet and bone have been found in Dutch Neolithic and Bronze Age context, both in settlements and in graves. Because ornaments are personal items, they are closely linked with people’s identity.

How do governments distribute resources across economic sectors during a crisis? And why do some sectors receive more than others? The recent COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the urgency of these questions. In this paper, we explore the extent to which a political economy…

How were (post) colonial migrants included in post-war welfare systems?

Who tried to influence the mission and position of the Dutch security services between 1912 and 1992, what effect did that have on the form and contents of the security services? How to account for transformations of the security services?

On 5 October, Katherine Filesia defended the thesis 'Speaking the same language: the introduction of the Anglo-American trust into the Dutch legal system'. The doctoral research was supervised by Pim Huijgen and Frans Sonneveldt.

The Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS) is one of the few research institutes in the world in which researchers in the field of literature, art, architecture, design and media studies come together to conduct research into the cultural production of the western world, from classical…

More than a thousand 17th- and 18th-century Dutch letters from seized ships are now available online. The letters are a gold mine for researchers wanting to study the everyday language used by men and women during this period.

Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS) is dedicated to ground-breaking and interdisciplinary research dealing with the relations between culture and society.

How to understand the simultaneously dis- and reappearance of letters in contemporary culture, and how does this Neo-Epistolarity relate to media-technological change?

What kinds of vocal music were not typically transmitted in written musical notation? Can specific ‘lost’ song forms - siciliane, giustiniane, le Grechesche, gli stili “regionali“ nel canto del quattrocento - be more precisely identified than they have been until now, both in musicological research…

Early Medieval Grave Reopenings in the Low Countries

Today’s performances of medieval polyphony have a lot in common with those of other ‘classical’ or ‘early’ music. Ensembles perform pieces written by known or lesser known composers, which the listener can revisit by listening to recordings or reading a score.

This book rovides an economic history of Portugal over the course of eight centuries, from 1143 through to 2010 and situates Portugal's economic growth within the context of European development. It also responds to fundamental questions about when, how and why the economy expanded, stagnated or co…

Bioarchaeology covers the study of all biological remains from archaeological sites.

De Pagus Renensis van de 4de tot de 8ste eeuw na Chr.: Een archeologische synthese

The department of World Archaeology combines research and education about regions all over the world, from Human Origins to the Middle Ages, and from Europe, to Asia, Africa and the America’s. That broad range in time and space makes the department a dynamic pluriform community with many different approaches,…

The Department of Archaeological Sciences seeks to achieve the highest standards of excellence in science-driven education and archaeological research across the globe and across all periods.

More on the Dutch webpage.

Political scientists Tom Louwerse, Simon Otjes & Cynthia van Vonno introduce the Dutch Parliamentary Behaviour Dataset, a record of parliamentary (voting) behaviour in the Dutch Tweede Kamer (Second Chamber, House of Representatives) since 1945.

A quantitative study on the use of pre-trial detention of juveniles in The Netherlands.

This article presents an in-depth evaluation of a specialized reintegration initiative within the Dutch Probation Service focused on individuals convicted or suspected of involvement in terrorism.

Niels van Willigen (Institute of Political Science, Leiden University) puts Dutch participation in UN peacekeeping into an historical context. He analyses the reasons for the Dutch withdrawal from the 1990s onwards, and explores the obstacles and opportunities for a structural return. Van Willigen argues…

Legal scholars and professionals are confronted with a rapidly increasing volume of legal publications. Only part of these publications are relevant enough to be cited. This project aims to determine which documents that are, and whether alternative metrics are a reliable way to predict whether documents…

Over time Dutch and Indonesian composers, performers and music scholars have inspired each other and they continue to do so. The presence of the Dutch in the Netherlands East-Indies and Indonesia, but also the existence of large diasporic communities in the Netherlands have contributed to a mutual exchange…

Do you have questions or remarks? Please contact the coordinators of the Medieval and Early Modern Studies cluster.

This dissertation addresses the different use of the same philosophical model: immanent teleology. In this work Aristotle, the founder of the study of final causes, is put in relation with the modern French evolutionary thinker Henri Bergson, the philosopher of time. The dissertation tackles the two…

In The Golden Mean of Languages, Alisa van de Haar sheds new light on the debates regarding the form and status of the vernacular in the early modern Low Countries, where both Dutch and French were local tongues. The fascination with the history, grammar, spelling, and vocabulary of Dutch and French…

We received the sad news that Janet van der Meulen passed away on November 29. She was an expert on French and Dutch literature in the medieval Low Countries. An in memoriam (in Dutch) has been published on the website of Neerlandistiek.

In the early modern period women played a prominent role in crime. At times they even made up half of all defendants. Female criminality was a typically urban phenomenon. Why do we find so many women before the Dutch criminal courts?

How can we promote social cohesion in a society that is culturally and religiously diverse?

Bones hold a wealth of information about a person’s life, revealing details about where they came from, how old they were when they died and what diseases they may have had. Scientists can use this data to piece together aspects of an individual's life, offering valuable insights that can help address…

An Investigation into the role of copper-alloy craft production in the early medieval economy of northwest Europe.

This volume sheds light on the role played by progeny in maintaining dynasties in early modern royal courts as well as the horizontal and vertical interplay between the actors. It attempts to break through the narrative of older research that saw dynasties as a series of male rulers. Instead, these…

Do you have questions or remarks? Please contact the core team of the Centre for Islamic Thought and History.

The Swahili coast has a long-standing history of transoceanic Islamic connections dating back to the 25th century. Yet, print, has changed the world – not only ours. This project unravels unique forms and archives of intellectual history emerging from within South-South connections. In East Africa Indian…

What did colonial officials and missionaries think they were doing?

On Tuesday, September 16, Professor Elisheva Baumgarten (Hebrew University) delivered the keynote speech entitled 'The Kindness of Others: Jews, Christians and Early Childhood Care in Medieval Europe' at the 'Care and the Jewish Experience' Conference at the Faculty Club in Leiden.

Transferring to the Bachelor's programme in Psychology at Leiden University

The Laboratory for Human Osteoarchaeology specialises in the macroscopic and microscopic analysis of human remains. We use cutting edge scientific approaches to address archaeological, historical, and anthropological research questions. In addition to paleopathological, histological, and 3D scanning…

Examine and experience the material features and characteristic appearances of medieval manuscripts, annotated books, prints, drawings, photographic albums and much more, in various settings.

Part of ‘Moralising Misfortune: A Comparative Anthropology of Commercial Insurance’, an ERC Consolidator project of Erik Bähre.

On October 31st, Margarita Gulian succesfully defended her doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Margarita on this great result.