Forthcoming
Publishing Programme 2025/2026
You can find all the titles published to date, as well as an outlook on the titles planned until autumn 2026, in our current publishing programme. heiUP titles are available online for free download and in print via bookshops.
Books
Fake News im Mittelalter?
The “post-truth era” and a new kind of threat from uncontrollable fake news have been central components in diagnoses of the present for several years. However, the question of how historically new such phenomena actually are is controversial. This volume, which brings together contributions from the fields of history and literary studies, aims to provide a fundamental clarification of whether and in what respect we can speak of fake news in the Middle Ages. A theoretical introduction and case studies are used to examine the extent to which structural analogies can be identified for the constellation of phenomena that are currently referred to as fake news in the European Middle Ages and where the heuristic limits of such anachronism lie.
Who Won the Sino-Nepalese War of 1791–1792?
The book deals with the history of the last war between Nepal and China-Tibet in 1791/1792. With a wealth of newly discovered and for the first time edited and translated texts from Nepal, China and Tibet, the volume forms a handbook of the sources of this Sino-Nepalese war. The focus is on the controversial question of who won the war. In the light of the new material, the core thesis is developed that both sides were able to declare themselves the winner and, without this being strongly disputed by the other side. This rare form of ending a war was mainly made possible by the transcultural complexity and different interpretations of the key terms used.
I Comuni cittadini italiani
Il volume raccoglie le recenti tendenze di ricerca analizzando i comuni italiani alla luce dei concetti guida di „protagonisti“, „artefatti“ e „processi“. Con queste categorie di indagine, che riprendono approcci di ricerca emergenti e particolarmente vivaci, si forniscono nuove prospettive inerenti agli sviluppi comunali. Mettendo in luce interdipendenze e spazi di interazione finora inesplorati, nonché canali di comunicazione e trasformazioni precedentemente trascurati, i contributi consentono una migliore comprensione degli intrecci di relazioni e delle dinamiche della vita quotidiana comunale.
The volume combines recent research trends, investigating the Italian city communes in light of the key concepts „actors“, „artifacts“, and „processes“. These analytical categories specifically address newly emerging and particularly dynamic research approaches, offering a novel perspective on the development of the commune. By revealing previously overlooked interdependencies and areas of interaction, as well as hitherto neglected communication channels and transformations, the contributions enable a better understanding of relational networks and the evolution of daily life within the communes.
“Gypsy” Genesis
This book aims to provide readers with a detailed account of the “Gypsy”, and a manifesto for reclaiming Romani memories and recognition by addressing the phenomena of resilience through intergenerational emancipatory narratives and agencies. It is based on five years of extensive research, including previous PhD results and the self-narratives and lived experiences shared by over 150 Roma intellectuals. Along with an in-depth critical literature review, the backbone of this uses a mixed research methodology that includes both qualitative and quantitative comparative analysis of first-, second-, third-, and intergenerational Roma intellectual dialogues and lived experiences dating back to the 1920s until the 2020s.
Editionswissenschaft – Textkritik – Digital Humanities
This interdisciplinary volume presents 25 editorial projects from Heidelberg University, the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, and the Heidelberg College for Jewish Studies, which are concerned with indexing and making available a wide variety of texts from different eras and in different languages. The contributions offer various perspectives on using digital tools and editorial methods to process and analyse texts that have been handed down. Providing a broad spectrum of insights into editorial practice, the volume demonstrates how editorial projects in the humanities contribute not only to acquiring new knowledge, but also to utilising it in the context of digital transformation.
Normen und Ideale
Every culture has rules and systems of norms that structure and organize social coexistence. These norms are not only enshrined in laws or religious commandments but permeate all forms of cultural expression. They can be found in religious and legal texts as well as in the visual arts, literature, philosophy, and political theory. In all areas of life and art, authors are guided by values. Their texts and cultural artifacts thus become testimonies to social negotiation processes. The contributions to this volume approach these negotiation processes from different perspectives.
Die Zeit der Entscheidungen
This comparative and entangled history of France and Germany from 1933 to 1945 opens up a deeper understanding of a pivotal epoch in European history. It was shaken by the Great Depression, torn apart by the rise of totalitarianism, and marked by the horrors of the Second World War. In these defining years of the 20th century, the constant pressure of events forced individuals and institutions to make fundamental civilizational decisions. On both sides of the Rhine, commitment became the key to the future: Germany established the genocidal “Thousand-Year Reich” and dragged millions of soldiers and civilians to their deaths. Simultaneously, resistance movements developed the highly significant idea of a united Europe underground, despite brutal repression.
Multifarious Sacred Geographies
Multifarious Sacred Geographies takes an in-depth look at the sacred geography of the South Indian temple city Kanchipuram. Kanchipuram's particularly diverse religious landscape, with over four hundred temples, is attested to in numerous Sanskrit and Tamil texts that glorify the city. Malini Ambach investigates for the first time three of these glorifying Sanskrit Sthalamāhātmyas in detail and comparatively with regard to their literary geographies of Kanchipuram. These texts link mythology with the local physical landscape and each coloured by a sectarian perspective, they describe the same sacred space, Kanchipuram, by constructing shared and contradictory notions of the temple city.
Femininity Resurgent
This study traces the codification of gender in Soviet Russian opera during Stalinism and the long Soviet sixties. It introduces the concepts of ‘masculinization’ and ‘feminization’ to describe the transition from operas dominated by martial, idealized male heroes to those with complex female protagonists that challenge and deconstruct Stalinist operatic conventions. Through detailed analyses of works by Tikhon Khrennikov, Sergey Prokofiev, Dmitry Kabalevsky, Rodion Shchedrin, Sergey Slonimsky and Kirill Molchanov, the study examines how opera reflects broader socio-political and cultural changes, contributing to musicology, gender studies and Soviet cultural history.
Postcolonial Infrastructure
Colonization is not least an infrastructure project. It involves the destruction of indigenous infrastructure and the transcultural transfer of military, political, social, and other infrastructure to establish and maintain power over colonized peoples. At the same time, infrastructure has emerged as a key site and means of resistance in the decolonial struggle. In this volume, fourteen scholars from literary and cultural studies, linguistics, musicology, and the environmental humanities explore this underrepresented yet essential dimension of colonial, postcolonial, and decolonial life.
Geologie und Mineralogie an der Universität Heidelberg
2018 the Institute of Earth Sciences at Heidelberg University celebrated the 200th anniversary of the inaugural speech of Carl Caesar von Leonhard (1779–1862), first professor of Mineralogy in Heidelberg. The attractive collections of the Institute’s museum would have been greatly appreciated by von Leonhard, himself a passionate collector of rocks, minerals and fossils. Today's Earth scientists, however, rely for their research less on collections, but more on expeditions, on laboratory work or on computer modelling. Already in the early 20th century, three Heidelberg Earth's scientists were renowned for their innovative research approaches and attracted students and visiting scholars from all over the world: the petrographer Harry Rosenbusch, the crystallographer Victor Goldschmidt and the geologist Wilhelm Salomon-Calvi. After World War II, the ore mineralogist Paul Ramdohr and the environmental geochemist German Müller brought strong new research impulses. In 1967 the institutes moved from their crammed work places in the old town to the new buildings on campus. This marks the end of this book, but the story of the Earth Sciences in Heidelberg still continues.
The God Who Does as He Is Told
This volume is the first comprehensive study of the Yathoktakārī Perumāḷ temple, one of the oldest Viṣṇu shrines in the South Indian temple town of Kanchipuram. Part one brings together essays that examine the temple from various perspectives, including its architecture, ritual traditions, and mythology. Part two offers editions and translations of key primary sources. Together, they provide an essential resource for understanding this important sacred site. This is the first volume in the publication series of the ‘Hindu Temple Legends in South India’ project, which investigates the textual and living traditions of Kanchipuram’s temples.
Umwelt interdisziplinär
Since 2011, Heidelberg University has been bringing together environmental research across the full spectrum of the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities under the umbrella of the Heidelberg Center for the Environment (HCE). Drawing on more than a decade of interdisciplinary collaboration, this volume reflects on the disciplinary foundations, key concepts, and selected fields of action of a broadly conceived environmental research agenda. At the same time, it provides a comprehensive overview of Heidelberg’s expertise, methodological approaches, and thematic research, illustrating how interdisciplinary perspectives contribute to a deeper understanding of contemporary environmental challenges.
