In the largest study of ancient DNA ever conducted, an international team of scientists has revealed the complex story behind one of the defining periods in European prehistory. The study is published this week in the journal Nature.

Both good employer practices and good employee practices are open norms. These open norms can lead to uncertainty about what employers should focus on and what rights (and obligations) employees have in that respect. The objective of this study is to give substance to the norm of good employment practices…

Scientists, including our faculty colleague Dr. Mike Field, studying an exceptionally well-preserved woolly rhinoceros have revealed details of what Britain's environment was like 42,000 years ago. The beast's remains were discovered in Staffordshire in 2002, buried alongside other preserved organisms…

Are traces of fire use detectable in ancient hominin genomes?

This study links up the concept of place with memory, with the idea of transience and the transition from life to death.

Surveying Indigenous Peoples’ culinary practices prior to the advent of European invasions in the Greater Caribbean

This thesis explores several aspects of these Early Old Babylonian Amorites.

In several Mediterranean regions archaeological sites have been mapped by fieldwalking surveys, producing large amounts of data. These legacy site-based survey data represent an important resource to study ancient settlement organization. Methodological procedures are necessary to cope with the limits…

Otrar as a Case Study for a 6-10th century Transition Zone

Can subgroups of people be differentiated whose attitudes on the Sinterklaas festivities and Black Pete cluster with either a) high Dutch national identification or b) a strong preference for social hierarchy, also known as social dominance orientation (SDO; Pratto et al., 1994)?

University Lecturer Bert van Den Berg shares about the recent research by The Greek Philosophical Schools project in Italy. The research sheds new light on the life and death of Plato.

Building a Deep Cross-media Transfer Network to extract visual relations that relieve the problem of insufficient training data for visual tasks.

On the 23rd of June Arianna Sacco successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

At the transition of the Neolithic to Bronze Age, a societal clash took place between a male dominated oligarchy (also known as the patriarchy) and the matriarchy. The latter managed to exploit vulnerabilities in the 'bro-code' to reboot society's operating system.

Since the publication of the article in the interdisciplinary journal Nature, over 200 news outlets have showcased the pioneering research.

Intelligence scholars have been struggling to find the conditions under which international intelligence cooperation occurs. Most focus on transactional motives and guaranteed returns, the so called ‘Quid pro Quo’. At the same time, trust is often mentioned as one of the foremost conditions, yet it…

This article examines how motivational signals in job advertisements relate to public employers’ recruitment success.

This volume presents fourteen papers by Roman archaeologists and historians discussing approaches to the economic history of Pompeii, and the role of the Pompeian evidence in debates about the Roman economy.

On the 20th of June, Camil Staps successfully defended a doctoral thesis. Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Camil on this achievement!

This project’s aim is to critically assess current homicide data sources in order to develop a proposal for long-term EU-level monitoring of DRH.

The Leiden University Institute for History has a wide-ranging academic scope unique for the Netherlands. This is directly reflected in the participation of her staff in various Master's and Bachelor's programmes at Leiden University.

Three alumni of our Master’s degree programme in Ancient History talk to us about how they found a job after graduation during the coronavirus pandemic. During the interview, Gabriël hung a huge board covered in post-it reminders behind his laptop, Molly was glad that the members of the selection committee…

Are you interested in ancient Egypt, the rich cultural heritage of Mesopotamia or bliblical Hebrew and Aramaic? Students of all faculties can follow electives of Ancient Near Eastern Studies without prior knowledge or special entry requirements. Archaeology student Annely Arends talks about her expe…

The Impact of Mobility and Migration in the Roman Empire assembles a series of papers on key themes in the study of Roman mobility and migration.

This thesis analyses the existence and the functioning of the urban labour market in the early Roman empire by looking at the crucial influence of social structures, such as the family and non-familial labour collectives.

This subproject of 'From Homo Economicus to Political Animal' analyzes Greek economic thinking of the Hellenistic period.

On April 26th, Kate Bellamy succesfully defended her doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Kate on this great result.

What are the behavioral, cognitive, and motivational consequences of decision reversibility?

Promotor: M.T.M. Koper, Co-Promotor: L.B.F. Juurlink

Regulating Relations: Controlling Sex and Marriage

In July 2022 our alumnus Samatar Botan received the news that he had received the NWO Mosaic 2.0 grant. This grant enables him to start a PhD research at our Faculty on the ancient Aksumite Empire, a topic that is close to his heart. We speak with him about his ambitions and drive. ‘I want to know more…

The central aims of this project are to establish the shapes of the various urban hierarchies existing in the provinces of the Roman Empire and (especially) to use the quantitative properties of these hierarchies to shed new light on levels of economic integration.

A major new study of ancient DNA has traced the movement of people into southern Britain during the Bronze Age. In the largest such analysis published to date, scientists examined the DNA of nearly 800 ancient individuals. Publication in Nature on December 22, 2021.

The sentencing decision of the judge might be the most important decision in the criminal proceedings, not only because of the impact the punishment has on the offender, but also because the sentencing decision is a cornerstone of the legitimacy of the entire criminal justice system.

Article by Leiden University political scientist Daniel Thomas about shifting norms for membership in international organisations.

To what extent was labour-induced migration important to the functioning of the towns and cities of Roman Italy?