50 years of Dispuut Pleyte: “At get-togethers I walked across the Rapenburg with boxes full of glasses”
Party for Dispuut Pleyte (so called after the 19th-century Dutch Egyptologist). The study association for Ancient Near Eastern studies and Classics and Ancient Civilizations celebrates its 50th anniversary. Ahead of the festive symposium on 7 June, we look back and ahead with chairman Steef Haeldermans and former treasurer Ben Haring.
Steef's interest in Pleyte initially had mainly a financial motivation, explains the association's current president. 'I also do history and I knew you can get discounts on books there through the study association. I hoped Pleyte would also have this.' That turned out not to be the case, but Steef's interest was piqued.
Shortly after the corona pandemic, he signed up as a member. 'I thought it would be nice, to get to know some people at such a smaller association.' A good idea, as it turned out. 'I really like the fact that we always combine content with sociability. For example, we organise a lecture, followed by drinks together.’
Glass hire
“We used to do that too,” responds university lecturer Ben Haring, who was treasurer of the association for two years in the 1980s. 'We usually organised lectures and drinks at one of the members' homes. For this, we rented glasses from Augustinus, so I regularly walked across the Rapenburg with a box of glass on my luggage carrier.' Steef: 'Fortunately, these days we have drinks in a pub. Lectures are in a room at the university, so we don't have to lug glass around.'
Lectures and drinks have been the main focus of Pleyte for 50 years, although Haring and his fellow board members once staged an exchange. 'That was quite an adventure, as we had chosen Poland during the period of the Iron Curtain. One of the professors had to personally guarantee that those people from Poland would actually leave again, which of course was not obvious at the time. We had even arranged a discount with a Polish airline, but one of us had a fear of flying, so in the end we went by train and the Poles came to us by hitchhiking. That was still possible back then.'
'We never did anything like that, no,' Steef responds, ‘although Pleyte currently also organizes museum excursions abroad’. He is now looking forward to the lustrum on 7 June, where six experts will talk about their fields during a symposium. 'Afterwards, we will conclude with drinks and a dinner, so once again the substantive will be combined with the pleasant.'
On 7 June Dispuut Pleyte celebrates her 50-year anniversary with a special Symposium (in Dutch). More information, please go to the event page.
Uncertain future
And after that? 'We already have a board for next year, so that's fine,' says Steef. 'After that, Pleyte's future depends on what the future of the study will look like. With the cuts that may be coming, I don't dare say that the association will still be there in 20 years' time. But if the study programmes will continue to exist, people will always be interested in an association like Pleyte.’
Haring: 'I think the programme will continue to exist and it has been a good move that Pleyte now also focuses on Near East and Classical studies. That way it keeps changing a little bit with the times.'
