Matthias Lukkes is a PhD Candidate at the Institute for History, working on the project Revisiting the Invention of Africa, 1590-1720. His research focuses on Dutch imaginations of Africa in the long seventeenth century and how these shaped a shared European understanding of African alterity.

More information about Matthias Lukkes

Matthias Lukkes is a PhD Candidate at the Institute for History, working on the project Revisiting the Invention of Africa, 1590-1720. His research focuses on Dutch imaginations of Africa in the long seventeenth century and how these shaped a shared European understanding of African alterity.

Matthias completed a research master’s degree in Colonial and Global History (cum laude, 2023) at Leiden University, where his thesis examined the lives and labors of bombas, enslaved and free African slave overseers in the Dutch transatlantic slave trade. Before starting his PhD in 2026, he held research fellowships at the Scheepvaart Museum Amsterdam (2024) and the Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome (2025), and also obtained a qualification as a secondary school history teacher (MA) from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Publications

2025

• [Boekdeel] Lukkes M. (2025), “Guarding Security, Managing Risks: West African Bombas on Dutch Slave Ships”, in: Negrón R., Oudsten J. den, Koning C. de & K. Fatah-Black K. (Eds.), The Dutch Slave Trade. New Data and New Perspectives. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. 175-194.
• [Boekbespreking] Lukkes M. (2025), Review of: Browne R.M. (2024), The Driver’s Story. Labor and Power in the World of Atlantic Slavery. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. TSEG-The Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History 22(1): 158-161.

2024

• [Boekbespreking] Lukkes M. (2024), Review of: Negrón R. & Oudsten J. den (2023), De grootste slavenhandelaren van Amsterdam: Over Jochem Matthijs en Coenraad Smitt. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. International Journal of Maritime History 36(3): 

2021

• [Boekdeel] Lukkes M. (2021), “De Utrechtse Compagnie: Investeringen in Slavernij”. In: Jouwe N., Kuipers M. & Raben R. (Eds.), Slavernij en de stad Utrecht. Zutphen: Walburg Pers. 57-74.
• [Boekdeel] Raben R., Jouwe N. & Lukkes M. (2021), “Bestuurlijk Utrecht, Koloniale Belangen en Slavernij”, In: Jouwe N., Kuipers M. & Raben R. (Eds.), Slavernij en de stad Utrecht. Zutphen: Walburg Pers. pp. 37-46.