In six months' time, Leiden City of Science 2022 will begin. Rob Zwijnenberg, chairman of the Faculty Steering Committee, talks about the plans.

Over 600 manuscripts and early prints have been made digitally available by Leiden University Libraries (UBL) via the Europeana platform. In the project 'The Art of Reading in the Middle Ages’ (ARMA), seven European heritage institutions added 30,000 digitised medieval items to Europeana’s database…

A team of Leiden researchers has won the Ammodo Science Award for innovative humanities research on perceptions of cultural heritage.

Warja Tolstoj, alumna Art History, has been awarded the 2021 edition of the Ted Meijerprijs. Named after the former director of the KNIR (Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome), the prize is awarded yearly to the best MA/ReMa thesis or PhD in the Humanities.

Maarten Feteris, the former president of the Court of Appeal and an alumnus of Leiden University, composed the piece ‘Intermezzo’ to mark the transfer of the rectorate during the Dies Natalis on 8 February 2021.

Publishing an article as early as during your studies. Master's students of Nanne Timmer and Astrid Weyenberg are doing it. In the new course 'Leiden Graduate Journal Culture and Society' they are creating an academic journal.

The Just Peace Festival's first edition is live! The Opening Event marked the beginning of two weeks filled with activities to reflect on what peace and justice mean in today's world.

Mike Schmidli recently joined the Institute for History as a lecturer in American History. He introduces himself.

Literature – and films and social media too – helps us understand ourselves and society. That makes literary studies an eternally modern discipline, especially if you dare to combine it with other disciplines, says Nidesh Lawtoo.

Master’s student Anna van Ark has landed her dream internship at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. For three months, she’ll be shadowing the curator and conducting research on Japanese prints for the acquisitions team.

An alumnus who wishes to remain anonymous has endowed a named fund to support Dr Miriam Müller’s historical and archaeological research on the earliest periods of Egyptian civilisation.

A lot of green, corners to sit in and paths to stroll along. These were the wishes for the restyling of the garden of the Huizinga building. After some forty years, it was time to give the garden a facelift. The result is a welcoming, green garden with sunny spots and shaded nooks.

On Tuesday, November 18, 2025, Ambassador Bert Theuerman (Austrian Ambassador to The Netherlands) hosted a Coffeehouse Discussion exploring the position and impact of women in science and arts at his residence in The Hague.

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?

The Washington Post reviews Nationalism by university lecturer Eric Storm. In this book, Storm explores how nation-states became the dominant political organizational form.

In its session of 15 April 2024, the Austrian Academy of Sciences elected professor Petra Sijpesteijn as one of its new Corresponding Members.

On Friday morning, 18 October, Rector Magnificus Hester Bijl and Professor Remco Breuker welcomed Korea Foundation President Gheewan Kim.

Academics regularly face threats, intimidation and abuse. The Universities of the Netherlands (UNL), the Dutch Research Council (NWO) and the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) therefore launched the WetenschapVeilig platform on 7 November 2022.

You can apply various means to increase your societal impact: through interaction with professionals, the commercial sector or general audiences. The University can support you in this process in a number of ways.

It was announced in December that a new draft urban development plan for the Humanities Campus is now ready. In drawing up this plan for the various buildings, outdoor space and traffic routes on campus, the facilities and layout of the buildings themselves were, of course, also considered. Discussions…

Caroline Schep and Bianca Angelien Claveria recently joined the Institute for History as PhD candidates in the ERC-funded project “Human Subject Research and Medical Ethics in Colonial Southeast Asia”, led by Fenneke Sysling. Below they introduce themselves.

Ten scientists from Leiden University will receive a Starting Grant from the European Research Council. This will allow them to launch their own project, form their own research team and implement their best ideas.

The LUCAS Dissertation Prize has been awarded to Dr. Renske Janssen for her PhD thesis Religio Illicita? Roman Legal Interactions with Early Christianity in Context.

On Tuesday 12 April Angus Mol and Aris Politopoulos have been awarded the fourth LUCAS Publieksprijs.

It was his thesis supervisor during his master's in Film and Photographic Studies who encouraged Shivan Shazad to pursue a second master's in diversity policy at Ghent. He is now Manager of Diversity and Inclusion at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.

American anthropologist Rosemary Joyce will be awarded an honorary doctorate from Leiden University on its Dies Natalis on 8 February. Joyce has delivered important new insights into the ancient Mayan cultures of Central America.

Dr. Lukas Verburgt, guest researcher at the Institute of Philosophy, has received an Early Career Award from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW). He received this award for his innovative research into changes in the way scientists and philosophers define the nature and boundaries…

It is with great sadness that Leiden University has learned of the death of Professor Cees Fasseur (11 December 1938–13 March 2016)

The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) announced on 25 April that it has appointed 18 new members. These include Leiden professors Andrew Webb and Jos Raaijmakers.

Within the scope of Leiden European City of Science, the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) presented the quadrennial Lorentz Medal to Daan Frenkel in the Academy Building yesterday. The ceremony was in collaboration with the Lorentz Center and was attended by Robbert Dijkgraaf, Minister…

Since 24 March, the Kamerlingh Onnes Building of the Faculty of Law has been full of hundreds of colourful jellyfish. But behind that enchanting sight is a serious message: the exhibition symbolises the loss of biodiversity in the oceans due to climate change.

Leiden University Libraries has been elected to the Executive Committee of the IIIF Consortium. The term of office is two years starting from January 2022.

Organisation

The Humanities Faculty Teaching Award has been won by Olja Karmanova. The Russian lecturer was presented with the award during the opening of the faculty year.

When designing public spaces, noise is often a neglected issue. Architects and urban planners know little about it; noise experts see it mainly as a problem that should be solved simply by reducing the volume. University lecturer Andrea Giolai (LIAS), researcher Kevin Toksöz Fairbairn (ACPA) and Professor…

Education, Research

Leiden University has seven top-rated bachelor's programmes according to Keuzigids universiteiten 2026, a consumer guide to university programmes. This is based on the National Student Survey.

‘Islam and Muslims are not something that happened to Europe; they are part of Europe. In fact, Islam is one the biggest constants in European history,’ argues Professor Maurits Berger in the new eight-part History of Islam in Europe podcast series of the Leiden University Faculty of Humanities.

LEAP is a peer-reviewed journal founded in 2021 by a team of junior and senior scholars of Leiden University as part of a Faculty-broad Master course. Each year the journal has a new editorial board and a new theme. Series editors Astrid van Weyenberg and Nanne Timmer guide this process and are assisted…

Between November 2022 and December 2023, 45 one-off and 14 structural security measures were taken for academics or university staff. This is what it says in the External Intimidation, Hatred and Threats against Academics Monitor published by the Universities of the Netherlands (UNL), the Dutch Research…

Leiden researchers Fenneke Sysling and Joris van der Voet will be admitted to the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences’ The Young Academy.

Playing a game, picking a cutting for your room or just having a cup of coffee: it is all possible in the new Humanities Living Room in the Matthias de Vrieshof. From Wednesday 17 May, staff and students will be able to meet informally and socialise here.

Thijs Porck, university lecturer of medieval English at the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (RHS).

Associate Professor Carolien Stolte has been appointed visiting professor at the Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome (KNIR). Stolte will continue her research into global peace movements there during the coming semester.

Leiden researchers Tazuko van Berkel (Greek and Latin Language and Culture) and Noel de Miranda (Tumour Immunology, LUMC) will join the KNAW’s Young Academy next year. They will be inducted on 22 March 2021.

Professor of Indonesian and Javanese Language and Culture Ben Arps has received the Anugerah Kebudayaan Indonesia (Indonesian Culture Award) from the Indonesian ambassador for his services to the field.

What will happen if the lights in a large part of the city are switched off? How many stars can you see without all that light pollution? This is what researchers, artists and the residents of Leiden are going to investigate during Seeing Stars Leiden on 25 September. ‘Leiden is the ideal place for…