The UBL holds seven collections recognised by UNESCO as documents of universal value and exceptional significance to the world. Six are included in UNESCO's International World Heritage list of documents or Memory of the World Register, one in the Dutch UNESCO register.

The main focus of the Islamic World Special Collections is on the Middle East and North Africa, with smaller holdings from Indonesia, the Indian Subcontinent and Central Asia as far as Xinjiang, China.

Nicky Schreuder is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Archaeology.

Dr Michael Kerschner is Senior Guest Researcher at the Faculty of Archaeology. Parallel to this position he is a research associate at the Austrian Archaeological Institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna and responsible for the research focus “Cult and Sanctuary” there. His main field…

Jan Frans van Dijkhuizen is Associate professor at the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society.

Walter Gam Nkwi is Assistant Professor at the Institute for History.

Alies Jansen is a PhD candidate in Global Transformations and Governance Challenges at the Institute for History at Leiden University. In 2025, she is a visiting researcher in the Program in Science, Technology, and Society at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Jan Sleutels is a Senior University Lecturer at the Institute for Philosophy.

Joanne Stolk is a Lecturer in Greek papyrology and Coptic connected to the Leiden Centre for the Arts in Society and the Leiden Papyrological Institute.

In collaboration with the The Hague Historical Museum and photographer Dagmar van Weeghel, Leiden University Libraries (UBL) is the first to present a retrospective exhibition of the photographic oeuvre of Alexine Tinne (1835 – 1869). New research into her life and work is the reason for a reappraisal…

Miguel John Versluys is Professor of Classical & Mediterranean Archaeology at the Faculty of Archaeology.

Olaf Kaper is a professor of Egyptology at Leiden University, specialized in the New Kingdom to Greek and Roman Periods. An expert in the fields of Egyptian religion, iconography and cultural history, he furthermore excavates in the Dakhleh Oasis.

Susana Valdez is an Assistant Professor of Translation Studies at Leiden University Centre for Linguistics and a Fellow of the Institute of Advanced Study at the University of Warwick. With a PhD in medical translation, her research intersects machine translation, AI, health communication, and migration.…

Ksenia Fedorova is a university lecturer at the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society. Within the Modern and Contemporary cluster of LUCAS, she is affiliated with the Environmental Humanities sub-cluster.

Nivja de Jong is Professor of Second Language Acquisition and Pedagogy at the University of Leiden, The Netherlands. She holds a dual position at the Centre for Linguistics and the Graduate School of Teaching (ICLON). She supervises MA and PhD students on diverse topics in the field of L2 learning and…

Remco Breuker is a historian of Korea and Northeast Asia, who works on medieval Korean and Northeast Asian history and on contemporary North Korean affairs. He published on the medieval state of Koryo, Korean historiography, Northeast Asia and North Korea, as well as literary translations from Korean…

Jason Laffoon is Associate Professor and Head of the Department of Archaeological Science, Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University.

Keiko Yoshioka is a Lecturer at the Leiden University Institute for Area Studies and Head of the Japanese language programme. She specialises in Japanese language and second language acquisition, with a focus on Japanese language pedagogy, multimodal interaction—especially gestures—Japanese ideophones,…

Jelena Prokic is an Assistant Professor in Computational Linguistics at the Leiden University Centre for Digital Humanities (LUCDH) and Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL). Since September 2024, Jelena Prokic has also been the Head of the Digital Humanities and AI Lab at the Faculty of H…

Peter Bisschop is Professor of Sanskrit and Ancient Cultures of South Asia at the Leiden University Institute for Area Studies. He is a Sanskritist and cultural historian of ancient India, with particular interest in the development of Hinduism and related traditions. His research is philological in…

Egbert Fortuin is Professor Russian Language and Linguistics.

Bart van der Boom is university lecturer at the Institute for History.

Today is World Philosophy Day. We asked three staff members from the Leiden Institute for Philosophy to name three of their favourite works from the Leiden University Library (UBL) collections. What is: the best introduction to philosophy, the best philosophical work published in the last few years…

Casper Wits is a University Lecturer in the Institute for Area Studies. His research focuses on postwar diplomatic and international history in East Asia, with a special interest in the development of Chinese and Japanse foreign policy and Sino-Japanese relations in this period. He also takes an interest…

The unique collection of more than 250 ancient tales revolving around the mythical Javanese Prince Panji, which is curated by Leiden University Libraries (UBL), has been acknowledged as world heritage by UNESCO. The UBL is grateful to UNESCO for this exceptionally prestigious award.