In 2013, Thijs Porck wrote a guest blog for 'medievalfragments'...

On 19 July Erik-Jan Zürcher, professor of Turkish languages and cultures, made a TV appearance in Nieuwsuur to talk about the actions Erdogan took after the failed coup.

From the effects of hormone fluctuations in women via the interior structure of giant planets to the prehistory of the languages: six Leiden researchers have been awarded a Consolidator Grant by the European Research Council.

Josephus Justus Scaliger was one of the most famous scholars of his time and yet today his name is likely to be met with blank looks. His correspondence shows that this Leiden professor was also irritable to say the least. Kasper van Ommen will defend his PhD thesis on Scaliger’s legacy on 2 July. Find…

Using enslaved people as servants, becoming an administrator in the Dutch West India Company or making uniforms for the colonial army. Many people from Leiden played a role in colonialism and slavery. Historians are conducting preliminary research and finding striking examples.

Negatieve ambtelijke adviezen lieten eerder zien dat het uitroepen van een asielcrisis op grond van het vreemdelingennoodrecht vanuit democratisch en rechtsstatelijk oogpunt niet aanvaardbaar is. Wim Voermans, hoogleraar staatsrecht, licht in Nieuwsuur toe welke hordes bij zowel bij de inzet van het…

As one of the first environmental scientists ever, Arnold Tukker received the honorary doctorate at Linköping University on Saturday 12 November. This Swedish university awarded Tukker for his scientific work to establish a circular economy.

Professor of Korean Studies Remco Breuker has been awarded a subsidy from the European Research Council to study the dispute between both Koreas and China on the history of Manchuria.

Gert Oostindie, Professor of Colonial and Postcolonial History, has been made an Officer in the Order of Orange-Nassau. He was awarded the royal honour by Leiden mayor Henri Lenferink after giving his valedictory lecture, ‘The future of the colonial past’, in the Academy Building of Leiden University…

Before founding their American colony, the Pilgrim Fathers first lived in Leiden in the early 17th century. This group has no fewer than nine American presidents among its descendants. The University played an important role in the Pilgrims’ life in Leiden.

Curiosities from the anatomical theatre, swords from the fencing school and 17th-century portraits of the University's founders. The new University Room in Museum De Lakenhal portrays the turbulent first hundred years of Leiden University.

Promovendus Tristan Mostert onderzocht de ‘kruidnageljacht’ op de Ambonse eilanden en ontdekte dat VOC-gouverneurs extreme tactieken gebruikten.

On Monday 28 November 2016, Ton Liefaard spoke at the International Conference on Crime Prevention and Resocialization of Children in Contact with the Criminal Justice System in Chile. In his lecture he discussed European perspectives on crime and prevention and reintegration.

The municipality of Utrecht is appealing to the Council of State following the decision by Dutch Minister of the Interior and Kingdom Relations Hugo de Jonge to cancel an initiative that would increase the asset limit for tax remission. Utrecht Nieuws NL reports that through the initiative, the municipality…

Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU in 2007. In 2011, the European Commission announced these Member States’ readiness to fully apply the Schengen rules and lift controls at the internal borders with other Member States. However, that decision has to be taken by the Council with unanimity. A number of…

Willemien den Ouden, Professor of Constitutional and Administrative Law and Academic Director of the Institute of Public Law has been appointed State Councillor at the Administrative Jurisdiction Division of the Council of State in the Netherlands.

Reijer Passchier, universitair docent staatsrecht en hoogleraar digitalisering en de democratische rechtsstaat (OU), reageert in het FTM scherp op de recente gang van zaken rond de rolverdeling in Nederlandse digitaliseringsstrategie.

It all started with demonstrations protesting about the death of George Floyd from police brutality in Minneapolis, but the Black Lives Matter protest is spreading like wildfire across the whole of the US. Every day, thousands of people are taking to the streets. We asked American Studies expert Sara…

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, Madiba, honorary doctor of Leiden university, was one of the iconic politicians of the late twentieth century. Mandela has died at the age of 95. Analysis by Robert Ross, Professor in African history.

Meike de Goede has received a research grant of €14,600 from the Gerda Henkel Foundation for her research on the post-colonial silencing of anti-colonial resistance in Congo-Brazzaville.

Spying in the seventeenth century was a man’s job. That had been the prevailing impression, until the Veni research by Nadine Akkerman from Leiden University...

Charles Darwin received an Honorary Doctorate from Leiden University on 9 February 1875. What traces did he leave behind in Leiden?

Arabist and papyrologist Petra Sijpesteijn has received a Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council for her research on the early Islamic Empire. The five-year ERC grant will fund the research project

This programme adopts a new approach based on the paradoxical nature of these responses in early modern Italy: it draws on rhetorical discussions of lifelikeness and living presence, and it uses the anthropological theory of art as agency developed by Alfred Gell.

The P.J. Cosijn Research Fellowship is an initiative to give promising Research MA students of Leiden University with an interest in Anglo-Saxon Studies the opportunity to conduct research on Old English language and literature. The Cosijn Fellowships are part of the ERC-funded project ‘Early Medieval…

The story of the iconic Silk Road is often told from the Chinese perspective. An exhibition at Oude UB focuses on the inhabitants and monuments of historical cities in Central Asia, a neglected part of the Silk Road. From 5 September to 17 October.

Fourteen women professors are to be given a place in the classic portrait gallery in Leiden University’s Senate Chamber. The portraits will be unveiled on 8 March – International Women’s Day – by former Minister of Education, Culture and Science Jet Bussemaker and Rector Magnificus Carel Stolker.

The death of George Floyd at the hands of the police may have sparked the Black Lives Matter protests in the United States and here in the Netherlands, but they are about more than that alone. We asked Karwan Fatah-Black, a historian who specialises in the Dutch colonial history, for his analysis. ‘We…

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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…

The success of Dutch radio astronomy in the last century was largely due to Leiden astronomer Jan Hendrik Oort. He made astute use of circumstances in the post-war period. Historian Astrid Elbers' research focuses on this golden period.

Since the end of the nineteenth century Arabic book designers have influenced the social and cultural situation in the Middle East with their work. Huda Smitshuijzen Abi-Farès has written the first global overview of this neglected field of science. PhD defence 10 January.

Dr. Alanna O’Malley, from the Institute for History, has been awarded a research grant of €12,000 from the Gerda Henkel Foundation, based in Dusseldorf, Germany. The Foundation supports scientific projects in the field of humanities that have a specialist scope and are limited in time. Dr. O’Malley’s…

This project studies travel writing about the Dutch East Indies written between 1800 and the end of the Second World War. By analyzing both Dutch travel texts and Indigenous travel texts in Javanese and Malay, it presents a new, double-voiced perspective on (the historiography of) the Dutch colonial…

Three Dutch research institutes - including the Leiden University’s KITLV - will conduct a follow-up study on the use of violence during the Dutch East Indies war of decolonisation (1945 – 1950). The government has designated 4.1 million Euros for this study.

A marvelous mosaic synagogue floor has been discovered at the Israeli excavation site of Horvat Kur. The timeworn stones of the mosaic clearly form the name ‘El’azar’. Leiden University researcher Jürgen Zangenberg and a group of Leiden students played a role in the excavation. ‘El’azar was likely an…

The tenth International Conference on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) and the Pacific will be a special edition with a focus on reconciliation. The fatal shooting in 1722 will be remembered, when the Dutch shot and killed ten Easter Islanders. The conference will be held in Leiden from 19 to 24 June.

He is primarily known for his protest speech against the dismissal of his Jewish teacher Eduard Meijers, but who was the man behind this iconic figure? This is the subject of the travelling exhibition 'On the trail of Professor Rudolph Pabus Cleveringa’. The exhibition can be seen from 16 January to…

The First Americans exhibition in the National Museum of Ethnology showcases the resilience and creativity of native Americans. Striking artworks, fashion and prints show that the past is never far away. Artist Jacob Meders was inspired by 16th-century prints from the Leiden University Library. The…

Historian Marjan Schwegman is the new Cleveringa Professor. Her lecture on 27 November will focus on Eduard Meijers, the Jewish professor who was dismissed by the Nazis. Schwegman's previous posts include Director of the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies.

FFashion, particularly fast fashion, is a major contributor to plastic pollution in the form of microplastic fibres. The 80-year-old Martindale test for interior textiles could be part of the solution.

You can follow the construction of the Wijnhaven quarter in The Hague, where the Faculties of Governance and Global Affairs and Humanities will hire the 2nd, 3rd and 4th floor, live via webcam.

De overheid moet in een democratie openbaarheid nastreven, maar soms is geheimhouding noodzakelijk om belangen als veiligheid of privacy te beschermen. De Wet open overheid (WOO) bevat daarom een recht op overheidsinformatie, maar staat ook uitzonderingen daarop toe om in de wet gespecificeerde belangen…

On Friday 3 February, Minister Bruins Slot of the Interior and Kingdom Relations appointed Fatma Çapkurt, of the Department of Constitutional and Administrative Law, to the Dutch State Committee on the Rule of Law. Chaired by Henk Kummeling, Rector Magnificus of Utrecht University, this State Committee…

Cijfers van Binnenlandse Zaken laten zien dat de wachtgeldregeling voor politici, in tien jaar tijd – door drie gevallen kabinetten - vijf keer groter is geworden. Barend Barentsen, deskundige in sociaal zekerheidsrecht, zegt in het FD dat dit ‘schuurt met de regeling om steeds meer versoberingen in…

LCD screens use liquid crystals which have a high degree of order, even though they form a fluid. A new theory maps out the interplay between order, temperature and symmetry. Publication in Physical Review X.

To mark its 75th anniversary, the Netherlands War Graves Foundation is publishing a portrait of a war victim every week this year. On 24 January the drawing of Irawan Soejono, a Leiden student and Indonesian resistance member, was unveiled at the Groenesteeg cemetery in Leiden, the place where Soejono…