Let's Talk About History

🗓 Save the Date: Lecture by Prof. Dr. Karsten Lambers on May 20, 2026, at 18:30 in Belval, Luxembourg

The organizing committee of Let’s Talk About History warmly invites you to a lecture by Prof. Dr. Karsten Lambers (University of Augsburg), titled “Citizen Science in Archaeological Prospection: Lessons Learned from the Heritage Quest Project in the Netherlands”, on Wednesday, May 20, 2026, at MSA 3.350, Maison du Savoir, Belval Campus.

Finding and recording material traces of the past is a key task of archaeology. However, doing so on a large scale, such as over an entire landscape, often exceeds the available resources of archaeologists and heritage managers. Citizen science offers an opportunity to involve interested volunteers in archaeological prospection. The Heritage Quest project in the central Netherlands (2019-24) achieved this in two intertwined ways. Firstly, an online platform enabled thousands of interested volunteers to contribute to the systematic screening of LiDAR data by identifying three common classes of archaeological features (barrows, Celtic fields and cart tracks) via a user-friendly user interface. Secondly, guided field trips enabled mostly local volunteers, many of whom had contributed to the online survey, to verify the online observations in the field. While the project doubled the number of known archaeological sites in the study area, the volunteers also provided new insights into many local contexts, and their initiative led to a follow-up project focusing on traces of WWII. Citizen science thus proved crucial for the success of our project in both quantitative and qualitative terms. In 2026, Heritage Quest serves as model for a similar citizen science project in Luxembourg.

👤 About the Speaker:
Karsten Lambers is Professor of Digital Imaging in the Humanities at the University of Augsburg, Germany. Until 2025, he was Professor of Digital and Computational Archaeology at Leiden University, where he served as co-PI of the Heritage Quest project. His research focuses on the use of remote sensing technologies in archaeological prospection. He completed his PhD at the University of Zurich with a dissertation on the recording and analysis of the Nasca geoglyphs of Palpa, Peru. He is currently co-PI of the TERRA project in Switzerland, which studies the origin and historical development of terraced landscapes in the Lower Engadine.

🗓 Date: May 20, 2026
📍 Location: University of Luxembourg, Campus Belval, Maison du Savoir – MSA 3.350
🕡 Time: 18:30–20:00

Register for the event here: https://www.eventbrite.fr/e/citizen-science-in-archaeological-prospection-prof-dr-karsten-lambers-tickets-1989091601525

University of Luxembourg C2DH - Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History

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🗓 Save the Date: Lecture by Prof. Alan Bowman on Wednesday, May 6, 18:30 in Luxembourg

The INRA - Institut National de Recherches Archéologiques , in collaboration with the Musée national d’histoire et d’art (MNHA), Musée Dräi Eechelen, the Institute of History (IHIST) at the the University of Luxembourg, and ArcheoLux, invites you to a lecture by Professor Emeritus Alan Bowman, titled “Vindolanda: Voices from Rome’s Northern Frontier”, on Wednesday, May 6, at the Auditorium of the Musée Dräi Eechelen.

The lecture will examine the Vindolanda tablets, discovered in 1973 at a Roman fort near Hadrian’s Wall. These documents constitute some of the earliest surviving handwritten texts from Britain and Northern Europe. They provide direct evidence on administrative practices, economic exchanges, and private correspondence among soldiers and their families. The corpus includes the earliest known birthday invitation written by a woman.

Prof. Bowman will address the methodological challenges involved in reading and interpreting these materials, and will discuss what they reveal about social and economic structures on the Roman frontier, with particular attention to units recruited from the Lower Rhine region.

👤 About the Speaker:

Alan Bowman is Professor Emeritus of Ancient History at the University of Oxford and a specialist in documentary papyrology and Roman history. He has led major research projects on the Vindolanda tablets and has published extensively on literacy, administration, and everyday life in the Roman Empire.

🗓 Date: Wednesday, May 6
📍 Location: Musée Dräi Eechelen, Auditorium, Luxembourg
🕡 Time: 18:30–20:00
🎟 Entry: Free

🗓 Save the Date: Lecture by Dr. Yves Schmitz on October 13, 2025, at 17:30 in Belval, Luxembourg

The organizing committee of Let's Talk About History warmly invites you to our second lecture of the semester by Dr. Yves Schmitz (Universität Hildesheim), titled “Small State Studies and History. Thoughts on Imperialism and Luxembourgish foreign policy”, on Monday, October 13, 2025, at MSA 4.510, Maison du Savoir, Belval Campus.

Dr. Schmitz will explore the possibilities and limits of applying Small State Studies to the history of modern Western imperialism and Luxembourg’s role during African decolonisation. Can the size of a state explain differences in colonial policies—whether between Belgium and France, or the Netherlands and Great Britain? And to what extent did Luxembourg’s foreign ministry define its choices through its own “smallness”? Drawing on case studies that cross scales and contexts, the lecture seeks to build bridges between historiographical traditions rarely put in dialogue.

👤 About the Speaker:

Dr. Yves Schmitz studied history at Universität Hamburg and University of Exeter and completed his PhD in Comparative Imperial History at The Philipp University of Marburg in 2021. He has held postdoctoral positions at the University of Bremen, University of Hagen, and University of Duisburg-Essen. In 2024, he co-published an award-winning introduction to Luxembourg’s colonial history with the art collective Richtung 22. Since October 2024, he has been Lecturer (Lehrkraft für besondere Aufgaben) at the University of Hildesheim.

🗓 Date: October 13, 2025
📍 Location: University of Luxembourg, Campus Belval, Maison du Savoir – MSA 4.510
🕡 Time: 17:30–19:00

🔗 Register on Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.fr/e/billets-small-state-studies-and-historyimperialism-and-luxembourgs-foreign-policy-1754675715299?aff=erelexpmlt

This Let’s Talk About History lecture is organized in collaboration with the Institut de l’Histoire (IHIST) and the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C2DH) - University of Luxembourg – University of Luxembourg.

🗓 Save the Date: Lecture by Prof. Ingmar Unkel on September 29, 2025, at 18:30 in Belval, Luxembourg

The organizing committee of Let's Talk About History is pleased to invite you to a lecture by Prof. Ingmar Unkel (Heidelberg University) titled “The Impact of Empire: Carrying Capacity of Eastern Mediterranean Landscapes under Societal Constraints”, on Monday, September 29, 2025, at the Black Box, Maison des Sciences Humaines, Belval Campus.

Prof. Unkel will examine the complex relationship between water scarcity and socio-economic resilience. Moving beyond linear narratives of rainfall decline and societal collapse, his talk will highlight how land-use potential (soil quality, agricultural availability, and governance choices) shaped societies’ capacities to withstand hydrological stress. Drawing on geoarchaeological archives, the lecture will explore how past practices still inform our understanding of resilience today.

👤 About the Speaker:

Ingmar Unkel is Professor of Physical Geography of the Anthropocene at Heidelberg University and a Fellow of the Marsilius-Kolleg der Universität Heidelberg. He previously served as Professor of Environmental History at Kiel University, where he was on the executive board of the Cluster of Excellence ROOTS and a principal investigator in the Collaborative Research Center 1266. He earned his PhD from the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences with a dissertation on the radiocarbon chronology of the Nasca Culture.

🗓 Date: September 29, 2025
📍 Location: University of Luxembourg, Campus Belval, Maison des Sciences Humaines – Black Box
🕡 Time: 18:30–20:00
🔗 Register on Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.fr/e/billets-the-impact-of-empire-carrying-capacity-of-eastern-mediterranean-landscape-1569451073409?aff=erelexpmlt

This Let’s Talk About History event is organized in collaboration with the Institut de l’Histoire (IHIST) and the C2DH - Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History University of Luxembourg