I studied Assyriology at the universities of Leiden and Heidelberg (1987–1993) and, from 1994 to 2002, served as a research fellow and subsequently a visiting scholar in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at Leiden University. During that period, I also taught Sumerian at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and KU Leuven. My areas of expertise are the administration and economy of ancient Mesopotamia during the earliest stages of its written record. In 2026, I began working as an external PhD candidate on a dissertation concerning the political economy of Sumer at the end of the third millennium BCE. In addition to these academic activities, I have extensive experience in various roles and over three decades of experience in social housing—including more than a decade in student and youth housing—as well as many years of experience in local government and several years in the healthcare sector.

More information about Remco de Maaijer

Fields of interest

Assyriology, Sumerian, Politics, Economics.

Research

Some 4,000 years ago, in Ancient Mesopotamia, the kings of the city-state of Ur reunited their neighboring city-states after they had been independent for some sixty years following the fall of the kingdom of Akkad. It will be researched whether the impression of a strongly centralized state, given by the ideological texts of the period, is supported by the administrative texts from the province of Lagash in Southern Mesopotamia (called Sumer at that time), one of the formerly independent city-states. The central question is: who stood to gain from the Ur III state and what was the economic and political role of its monarchy?

Curriculum vitae

1993 MA Assyriology, Leiden University
1993 Certificate Assyriology, Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg
1994-1998 Research fellow, Leiden University
1998-2002 Visiting scholar, Leiden University
1994-2002 Guest teacher, Free University Amsterdam and KU Leuven
2026 External PhD candidate, Leiden University

Selected publications

1998 “Land Tenure in Ur III Lagaš.“ In Ben Haring and Remco de Maaijer, Landless and hungry? Access to land in early and traditional societies : proceedings of a seminar held in Leiden, 20 and 21 June, 1996. Leiden : Research School CNWS, School of Asian, African, and Amerindian Studies. CNWS publications: 50-73.
2001 “Late third millennium identifying marks.” In W.H. van Soldt, J.G. Dercksen and N.J.C. Kouwenberg, Veenhof anniversary volume. Studies presented to Klaas R. Veenhof on the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday. PIHANS 89: 301-324.
2008 “Šulgi’s Jubilee: Where’s the Party?” In Piotr Michalowski, On the third dynasty of Ur : studies in honor of Marcel Sigrist. JCS, Supplemental series, number 1: 45-51.

Publications