Historical story

• No fear of sex

  Until the middle of the 17th century, almost everyone in Europe was convinced that sex was dangerous, that it could disrupt society. Sexuality therefore had to be curbed with might and main. In 1800, very little of these ideas was left. In the intervening period a revolution took place:sex became a

• Guest column on Britain's Queen Elizabeth II

  A guest column appears on Kennislink every week. The columnist is always a different researcher, who writes from his or her field about the science behind an event in society or from our daily lives. This week:historian Peter Rietbergen on the British Queen Elizabeth II. Every day, Elizabeth II of

• Forty Years' War made Republic poor

  During much of the seventeenth century, the Netherlands was a wealthy, prosperous republic and one of the major powers on the world stage. During the eighteenth century, economic stagnation and decline dominated. The gap between rich and poor quickly widened. Around 1750, the Republic no longer coun

• Book special Second World War

  Even in 2012, the Second World War remains an inexhaustible source of fascinating historical stories and new insights. The period 1939 – 1945 is therefore a popular subject among writers and history book enthusiasts. The following recent war books are definitely worth reading, according to the Kenni

• The ups and downs of our democracy

  On September 12, we will go to the polls for the sixth time in ten years. Since 1998, no cabinet has served its full four-year mandate. Is that a sign that there is something wrong with our democracy that has been so taken for granted? Rather, it is an indication that the functioning of our democrac

• Isaac Israels on location

  Art connoisseurs and dealers were a lot easier a century ago in naming paintings. Recent research has shown that dozens of works by the impressionist painter Isaac Israels were then given the wrong titles. The locations to which these works are named often do not match the actual locations. You som

• Dutch comes from Turkey

  Dutch, English, French and other languages ​​belonging to the Indo-European language family have so many similarities that there must be one common original language. Where this ancient language was once spoken has long been a matter of debate. New Zealand linguists think they have an answer. Dutch

• Eugène Dubois, the multi-talent

  He was a physician, anthropologist, anatomist, paleontologist and ecologist. He was stubborn, intelligent, hardworking and extremely driven. From the time he was young, Eugène Dubois had one big goal in mind:to find the fossil intermediate between man and ape. The Dutchman Marie Eugène Franҫois Tho

• He did not collaborate with the occupying forces. He was the occupier

  Historian Bas Kromhout became fascinated by the Dutch SS man Henk Feldmeijer and his almost religious belief in National Socialism. Kromhout wrote a biography about De Voorman, on which he recently obtained his PhD at the University of Groningen. “Feldmeijer was one of the few Dutch Nazis who was wi

• Making mummies after natural example

  What do you do when you find that all your long-dead and buried relatives do not perish but remain with you through natural mummyification? You are going to imitate the process. Seven thousand years ago, in this way, a lively death cult arose among hunter-gatherers in the Chilean Atacama Desert. Res

• Baron Georges Cuvier, the stubborn one

  He disliked exploration, worked day and night and inadvertently provided the impetus for Darwins theory of evolution. The Frenchman Georges Cuvier was one of the greatest scientists of the first half of the nineteenth century. Kennislink did a fictional interview with the stubborn, hard-working man

• In Search of Biblical Kingdoms

  Is there anything in Israeli soil that confirms with certainty that the glorious stories of the Bible are true? No. In fact, for the period before 800 BC, there is an ugly contradiction between our written sources and the finds. What can you do as an archaeologist in such a case? The sources, colle

• Did Neanderthals use drugs?

  Researchers from the universities of Barcelona and York have found evidence that Neanderthals must have had knowledge of medicinal plants. They write this this week in the journal Naturwissenschaften – The Science of Nature. The Neanderthal is a prehistoric human species that lived in large parts

• Maria Sibylla Merian, the artist

  Long before Darwins voyages of discovery, a 52-year-old woman traveled alone with her daughter to Suriname to beautifully portray the metamorphosis of insects. The German Maria Sibylla Merian showed what hardly anyone had seen before. Kennislink did a fictional interview with the silent but very tal

• 1936:Hitler's Olympic Games

  “We must be more charming than the Parisiennes, more lighthearted than the Viennese, more lively than the Romans, more cosmopolitan than the Londoners and more practical than the New Yorkers,” reported Joseph Goebbels Berlin propaganda newspaper Der Angriff on July 5, 1936. Just under four more. wee

• Important Archaeological Finds in Horvat Kur

  An international team of Leiden students and scientists, among others, has uncovered a unique combination of elements of synagogues from the Byzantine period. This happened during work at the Horvat Kur excavation site in Galilee (Israel). Leiden archaeologist Prof. Dr. Jürgen Zangenberg and his fe

• Market Economies Before the Industrial Revolution

  Many of the expected trends in labor have not materialized. In the 1970s, historians and economists still assumed strong unions, shorter working weeks and more permanent contracts. What went wrong here? Historian Jan Lucassen comes up with new insights. A few months ago, Lucassen, who works at the

• Early medieval graves found near Oegstgeest

  During an excavation in Oegstgeest, Leiden archaeologists came across two early medieval graves. They are graves of adult women, who were buried in a pit. Remnants of bronze jewelry and a string of beads were found on the skeletons. The tombs date from the seventh century. Large settlement The disc

• Media violence and propaganda

  When the Eighty Years War had already started, but Amsterdam still had a strict Catholic city government, a lively public debate was held in that city. Several camps used a spin doctor-like media strategy to get the city population behind them. This went much further than just using the printing pre

• Screenwriter Alex van Galen about the use of history in Michiel de Ruyter film

  With historical films it is always very easy to say that it is not right, also with the new hero epic Michiel de Ruyter. That is why Kennislink enters into a conversation with screenwriter Alex van Galen, who is happy to explain his choices. Historian and biographer of De Ruyter Ronald Prudhomme van