Quietly read a book in our new reading nook, listen to interesting and bizarre stories set in early twentieth-century Leiden, walk past literary locations in Leiden and watch the best film adapted from a Leiden novel as decided on by you. April is Literary Leiden month! A month in which we pay special…

The programme for the Leiden Asia Year in 2017 is now available. Rector Carel Stolker launched the new website leidenasiayear.nl at the opening of the Academic Year of Leiden University on 5 September.

Twenty-two of the 150 newly elected members of the Dutch House of Representatives studied at Leiden University or did their PhD research here. But who are they and which degrees are most popular?

Leiden fulfills a special role in Dutch literature: as a setting for stories as well as a place of work and residence for leading authors. It is the city described by Willem Bilderdijk as "O Leiden, Flower of Cities," but depicted far less glamorously by F. Bordewijk. The same city where Boudewijn Büch…

The new Japanese Ambassador, Michii Rokuichiro, visited Leiden University on 2 March.

Leiden University celebrated its 444th anniversary with a historical procession on 8 February. It celebrated this year’s Dies Natalis in time-honoured fashion with a ceremony in the Pieterskerk, but broke with tradition by sending professors out to primary schools.

Leiden University Libraries (UBL) has received considerable funding from the National Library of Israel (NLI) and the Friedberg Jewish Manuscript Society (FJMS) for the digitisation of a collection of 166 Hebrew manuscripts. The digitised manuscripts will be made available to the public in the course…

Every year on 26 November Leiden University commemorates the protest speech given by Professor Cleveringa against the Nazis. At least 663 students, staff and alumni of the University lost their lives during the Second World War, yet little was known about these victims. PhD candidate Adriënne Baars…

Recently, the oldest parts of the Leiden University Archives have been preserved and digitised thanks to a grant from Metamorfoze. This makes an important source on the history of Leiden University – and academic life in the Northern Netherlands in a broader sense – widely available.

On 28 October, Leiden University received the first Javanese Culture Prize from Universitas Sebelas Maret in Solo, Indonesia. The jury praised Leiden University’s extensive collection of Indonesian and Javanese manuscripts.

Leiden Professor of Maths Frans van Schooten Jnr. (1615-1660) and his wife Margrieta were painted by Rembrandt. This is the claim made by mathematician and art historian Johan Zwakenberg in his recently published article in the 2018 Leiden Yearbook. Leiden art historians are not completely convinced…

Help us develop and expand the recently established Leiden Chinese Queer Collection (LCQC, 莱顿华语酷儿文献收藏) at Leiden University Libraries (UBL).

Our ever-increasing reliance on software and technologies, out of convenience, necessity or otherwise, binds us to supranational and commercial companies that provide them. Is it essential that governments, universities, and researchers ensure that they continue to be in control of their data and software?…

Leiden University Libraries revives Imperial Prague in Leiden with the exhibition Prague around 1600: Art and science at the court of Rudolf II. The exhibition can be seen from the 29th of September 2016 to the 10th of January 2017, in the exhibition hall of the Leiden University Library at the Witte…

Leiden University Libraries (UBL) has been able to acquire four remarkable medical manuscripts partly thanks to support from the Friends of Leiden University Libraries, the Pieter van Foreest Stichting and the Van de Sande Fonds. All four are largely written in Dutch and can be dated between 1595 and…

The Leiden Law Blog is celebrating its first anniversary. The blog attracts many visitors and scores well in Google. Tips for bloggers: link to previous blogs, post them on social media and respond to comments.

To mark the university’s 450th anniversary, the Leiden Discoveries science route has been updated and was relaunched on the Night of Discoveries. New signs in town and a revamped website tell Leiden residents and visitors the stories of the city’s spectacular discoveries.

Research on quantum computers and Islamic charities: two Leiden researchers have received a Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council.

Throughout the coming year, all attention in Leiden will be on Asia. This special year, featuring numerous Asian events, conferences, exhibitions and concerts, celebrates the new Asian Library at Leiden University. Come and read, watch, listen, taste or dance Bollywood style.

Leiden University Libraries (UBL) recently digitized circa 150 Yemeni manuscripts and has made them freely available for research and education. The manuscripts, dating from the seventeenth to the twentieth century, were digitized as part of the Zaydi Manuscript Tradition project. Yemen has been marked…

2017 was the Leiden Asia Year. Leiden has had connections with Asia and built up extensive knowledge of the continent over many centuries. This Leiden-Asia link has been in the spotlight for the past year.

On January 13, Prof. mr. Rick Lawson, dean of the Faculty of Law, handed over to Prof. mr. Carel Stolker, Rector of Leiden University, a binding with rare law disputations. The book is a present of the Law Faculty to the University on behalf of its 440th anniversary (1575).

The Centre for Digital Scholarship of Leiden University Libraries Leiden collaborates with Leiden researchers, faculties, national and international colleagues and centres of expertise to facilitate and support Digital Scholarship – data management, Open Access and answering research queries – using…

Rembrandt van Rijn is inextricably linked to the city of Leiden. He was born and raised here, went to school in the city, and spent the early years of his career in Leiden, a career that would one day make him one of the greatest painters in Dutch history. There is a similar connection between Rembrandt…

The Pilgrims to America exhibition at Museum De Lakenhal inspires reflection. How far do you go in the quest for freedom? It focuses on the Pilgrims’ relationship with the University and which knowledge they took with them from Leiden.

Three cholera epidemics struck 19th-century Leiden. Today’s corona epidemic prompted Martijn Storms, curator of maps and atlases at the Leiden University Libraries, to scour the library for maps about these past epidemics.