During this course, specialists from Leiden University and beyond will provide instruction on issues of editing, paleography and conservation of oriental manuscripts. They will also speak about philology, literacy and orality and the transmission of knowledge in the Islamic manuscript culture, presenting…

This is an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility project of Leiden Law School with three universities in Kenya.

This is an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility project of Leiden Law School with the University of Dar es Salaam.

Chaider Bamualim defended his thesis on 9 September 2015

On 27 November 2018, the Center for Legal and Comparative Studies of the East African Community of Leiden University (LEAC) is organizing, in close cooperation with Strathmore University Law School, the University of Nairobi Law School and the IRID, the Fourth LEAC Conference on the topic “Teaching…

Abrupt Climate Change and Cultural Transformation

Report on the Excavations of the University of Amsterdam (1988) and the National Museum of Antiquities Leiden (1991-1993) in Syria.

Studies in Early Near Eastern Production, Subsistence, and Environment, vol.16. Edited by Noriyuki Shirai.

Find out how to apply for East Asian Studies at Leiden University by following our step-by step guide.

A linguistic prehistory of the Tarim Basin in Northwest China

This is an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility project of Leiden Law School with the University of Rwanda.

Over 200 people paid their first visit to the new Middle Eastern Library on a special open evening. As well as exploring the library, they got to see exhibitions, speed lectures and premieres about Leiden University’s Middle Eastern collections.

The Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo is an academic centre providing services for scholars and students from the supporting universities.

The Jordan Times interviewed professor Peter Akkermans about this research on ancient tombs in Jordan's Eastern Desert. “The evidence of this flourishing culture can be seen, among other things, in the diverse and complex burial record which we are currently investigating.”

The Central and East European Studies Centre is hosted by Leiden University.

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…

Knowledge of Muslim societies is essential to function in a globalised world and to fully understand our own Dutch society. Leiden researchers explore the languages, cultures, religions, legal systems and history of Muslim societies and in this way contribute to a centuries-old tradition.

This dissertation, Layered Loyalties: The Natuurkundige Commissie in the Netherlands Indies (1820-1850), studies the Natuurkundige Commissie.

The Dutch colonial past in Indonesia has had a major influence on literature.

The Netherlands Institute in Turkey (NIT) conducts scholarly research and supports the academic study of Turkey through the ages. The institute is closely affiliated with University’s Faculty of Humanities. Its facilities are available to students and staff of all universities in the Netherlands.

LIAS aims to advance the globally conscious vision of area studies, both within and outside the academic community. Focusing on Asia and the Middle East, the institute is a meeting place of multiple fields of inquiry, theories and methods, historical periods, and areas.

The Iraqi archaeological site of Nimrud was recently recaptured from IS. The site has been severely damaged. The question now is, what to do with it? Should it be restored? Bleda Düring spoke with Trouw about this complex issue.

This book argues that Armenians around the world – in the face of the Genocide, and despite the absence of an independent nation-state after World War I – developed dynamic socio-political, cultural, ideological and ecclesiastical centres. And it focuses on one such centre, Beirut, in the postcolonial…

The MA Asian Studies East Asian Studies offers focused study of China, Japan or Korea. You can study the country of your choice from an expansive number of disciplinary perspectives including history, literature, art, art history, sociology, anthropology, media, cultural studies, religious studies,…

The researchers in the World Archaeology department of the Faculty of Archaeology concentrate on a range of different periods and regions: from humanity’s origins to the Middle Ages and the modern age, and from Asia to South America.

The new Middle Eastern Library (MEL) will bring together the UBL's own Middle Eastern collections and the collections of the library of The Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO), which has been part of the Leiden University Libraries since 1st January 2018.

Commonplace - Photographs from the Drummond-Fyvie Collection and the Ngilima Collection. By Tamsyn Adams and Sophie Feyder.

Elizabeth Hicks won first runner-up in the Netherlands Institute of the Near East (NINO) MA thesis 2021 competition at the end of January.

Southeast Asia is a term to denote a collection of at present eleven nation-states with an enormous diversity in languages, cultures and religions. Muslims can both take a majority and a minority position.

The gripping story of a collective passion for freedom that shook the world.

Our ambition to contribute to society and the world, searching to solutions to the global challenges of our time, can only be achieved with solid relationships worldwide.

This COIn Grant 2025 awarded project allows Leiden University researchers and students to do research on the world’s largest corpus of digitized Ottoman language periodicals and books.

Overview of the Leiden Asia staff per area or country.

Report on the Excavations of the National Museum of Antiquities Leiden in the Balikh Valley, Syria.

Balikh Valley Archaeological Project Monograph 1 - BAR International Series 468

The Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo (the NVIC) was founded in 1971. Nine universities in the Netherlands and Flanders participate in the institute with an aim to stimulating internationalisation of their teaching and research activities in the Middle East.

Do you want to discover a language and culture that is completely different from the Netherlands? In the Bachelor's programme Middle Eastern Studies you will study the connections between the different cultures in the Middle-East in the past and present. You will be able to choose from the languages…

For a long time, the painful history of colonial slavery received too little attention. People whose ancestors lived in slavery are now asking critical questions about how we should address that past. Leiden University researchers study the history of colonialism and slavery and their long-term impact…

This PhD project investigates the different uses of Mandarin