Until the 18th century, Latin annotations of well-known classical texts were an important source of scientific knowledge, but over the course of time the texts lost their authority. Classical scholar Maarten Jansen re-examines the annotations of Virgil's Aeneid. PhD defence 20 September.

Every year, the Leiden University Student Platform (LUS) chooses the best lecturer in the university. The prize is awarded during the Opening of the Academic Year, this year on 5 September.

The use of fire can tell us a lot about human evolution. Archaeologist Femke Reidsma has developed a more accurate technique to identify how our ancestors used fire. Existing archaeological studies will need to be revised. Reidsma’s study was published in Nature Scientific Reports on 2 November.

The European Research Council, better known as the ERC, turns ten this year, and researchers from Leiden celebrated this on 23 June. The ERC is an important provider of research funding, also to Leiden University. Over the past ten years researchers from the University have been awarded over 70 ERC…

The Faculty of Humanities’ On-Campus Master’s Experience Day was a pleasantly busy event. The information sessions and corresponding information market went down well with interested undergraduates.

Manuscripts that look like a comic book, that's how you could describe the manuscripts of the Dongba people from China. The manuscripts are one of the last examples of a so-called pictographic script that can only be interpreted by Dongba priests, shamans, who have knowledge of the ancient Dongba cu…

Professor Herman Paul has been appointed Scientific Director of the Institute of History from 1 February 2025. ‘Especially in these times, transparency is essential.’

A new study published in Archaeometry describes the unexpected results obtained from analyses of five human teeth discovered in a ritual cache at an enslaved African plantation site on the island of Saba in the Caribbean.

A secret code that we currently use to send e-mails securely is based on the maths of a century ago. The geometrical surfaces that Dino Festi studied during his PhD research will perhaps be used in future codes or new physics. PhD defence 5 July.

Skandapurāṇa V presents a critical edition of Adhyāyas 92-112 from the Skandapurāṇa, with an introduction and annotated English synopsis.

Research on the Greek and Roman times often focuses on important leaders, writers or politicians. However, Patricia Kret is more interested in the normal people living in these times. Her research focuses on amulets which were often used, for example to cure diseases. Why did people believe so strongly…

How did the mythical kings of ancient Persia live? In this podcast, we delve into the Shahnameh, also known as the Book of Kings.

The first congress of the UU Paleohub, 'The Future of Paleography, Paleography of the Future'. 10 april 2025

The Leiden Jewish Studies Association is pleased to announce a call for nominations for the

Free advice and tips on the job market from a Leiden alumnus. This is what the Leiden University Mentor Network offers. Curious about how it works? Hear what a number of users have to say about how the Mentor Network has helped them. Maybe you need a mentor yourself, in which case sign up today!

Chiara Piccoli has been awarded a scholarship by the Italian Research Council to work at the Virtual Heritage Lab of the Institute of Technologies applied to Cultural Heritage (ITABC-CNR) in Rome.

Skandapurāṇa III presents a critical edition of the Vindhyavāsinī Cycle (Adhyāyas 34.1-61, 53-69) from the Skandapurāṇa , with an introduction and annotated English synopsis.

On 8 December, on the occasion of her 65th birthday, Cisca Hoogendijk was surprised with a festive bundle of 56 text editions by friends and colleagues, edited by her former students Dr Joanne Vera Stolk and Guus A.J.C. van Loon, MA.

Between 10 and 22 August 2025, Institute for Digital Humanities at the University of Göttingen, Germany, organizes its 4th Summer School in Digitital Paleography. Application deadline 30 April 2025

We are proud to announce that Amirardalan Emami has been awarded the Houtan Scholarship (3500€) to help fund his PhD project “Transformation in Ancient Iranian Religion: The Achaemenids as Agents of Long-Term Change”.

In his Inaugural lecture of February 10th Prof. dr. Henk Borgdorff advocated positive understanding of artistic research, of reasoning in and through art, within academia.

History and Religious Studies in Leiden rank # 17 and #32 in the QS World University Rankings by Subject. With this, History in Leiden ranks as the best in The Netherlands and Religious Studies ranks as second best.

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

In Mapping the Pāśupata Landscape: Narrative, Place, and the Śaiva Imaginary in Early Medieval North India, Elizabeth A. Cecil explores the sacred geography of the earliest community of Śiva devotees called the Pāśupatas.

NOSTER, the research school for Theology and Religious Studies, organizes a Coptic Course in the fall of 2023. Students can enroll until October 1.

Many thanks for visiting the Master’s Open Day on Friday 2 November! We hope that you enjoyed the day and that all your questions were answered.

Ancient clay tablets, between 2,500 and 4,000 years old, bearing cuneiform script have been scanned using a micro-CT-scanner at Delft University of Technology. The tablets are owned by the Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO).

On Tuesday, December 9 2025, Prof. Koen Ottenheyn delivered the last Austria Centre lunch talk of 2025. Prof. Ottenheyn serves as a professor of architectural history at Utrecht University, The Netherlands, and is a member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences and the Academic Curatorium which advises…

The application procedure is broken down into three parts:

The Journal of the LUCAS Graduate Conference was founded in 2013 to publish a selection of the best papers presented at the biennial LUCAS Graduate Conference, an international and interdisciplinary humanities conference organized by the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS). The…

Forum essays provide a framework for intellectual exchange and debate about the role of diplomacy around a particular theme. The essays are argumentative contributions and are shorter than research articles.

The Institute for Philosophy at Leiden University is host to the NWO programme,

The NVIC has published a series of scholarly publications in Arabic and several European languages.

Athens is universally known as a symbol of democracy, philosophy, and ancient Greek aesthetics. Some of the most famous classical monuments, including the Parthenon and the temple of Hephaestus, can be found here.

Leiden Asia Departments

My NVICairo Experience - Marie Costers (MA student, University of Antwerp, NVIC student Spring 2025)

Research in the arts at the Academy of Creative and Performing Arts (ACPA)  

This project aims to answer the following questions: how did the landscape and geography of the local surroundings of Chalcis impact medieval to early modern productivity, habitation, mobility and interaction in a wider sense? And where are such changes and continuations still visible in the landsca…

In your first year at LUC you gain the basic knowledge and lay the foundation and skills for your specialization in year two and three.

During the two-year History Research Master's programme you will learn from inspired academics and learn how to conduct high quality research.

The LUCDH foster the development of new digital research by awarding a number of Small Grants each year. These are our past awardees.

In November, Leiden organized a book presentation to celebrate the first Dutch translation of the collected works of the twentieth-century poet W.H. Auden. A poetry translation contest added lustre to the occasion. There were no fewer than three winners.

Like many others, Ruurd Halbertsma has had a rollercoaster of a year. His museum, the National Museum of Antiquities (RMO), was closed for a long while because of the lockdown. Visitor numbers picked up again from September, but it the next few weeks will be tense now the hospitals are full again. Halbertsma:…

Lucia Langerak was awarded a Master’s degree in Egyptology with cum laude honours in 2018. Her bachelor’s degree was also with cum laude honours. ‘I’m an exceptional Egyptologist, if only because I’ve never been to Egypt.’ She is now the coordinator of the Access & Support Platform at the University…

Hugo Koning, an expert in Greek mythology, has won the Lucas Public Prize because he has brought his research to the attention of the general public in so many different ways. This is the first Public Prize awarded by the Leiden University Centre for Arts in Society (LUCAS). Hugo says with a smile:…