Brief historical overview

The roots of the K.U.Leuven are situated six centuries ago, when the city of Leuven requested a university, with the support of Duke Jan IV of Brabant. Pope Martinus V founded the university as Studium Generale, with the papal bull of December 9, 1425. This means that the K.U.Leuven is the oldest catholic university in the world that still exists and it can call itself the oldest university in the Low Countries. Similar to the model of the universities of Cologne, Paris and Vienna, the university of Leuven initially had four faculties: Artes, Canon and Civil Law en Medicine. In 1432 the faculty of Theology was added. Today thirteen Faculties and Institutes offer a complete variety of studyprogrammes and scientific disciplines.

From the beginning, the Faculty of Medicine was a part of the core of the university of Leuven. In the fifteenth century the curriculum contained the courses anatomy, physiology, hygiene, diseases and their treatments and the study of remedies. The education consisted of six years of study, two candidatures and four licentiate years. The scientific knowledge was rudimentary, experimenting did not exist and medicine was considered an art rather than a science, more theoretical than practical. It wasn't before the arrival of Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564), a great-grandson of a former professor in medicine, mathematics and astronomy Jan Van Wesele, that solid scientific methods were applied, in the first half of the sixteenth century. Vesalius issued his first article on antatomy when he was still a student in Leuven. The scientific method remained controversial till the end of the eightteenth century.

In the starting period of the university, the city of Leuven put the Lakenhal at disposal, built in 1317 and where upto then clothweavers sold their merchandise. Soon it became too small for lectures. Today it is the place of residence of the management of the university. In the sixteenth century, the university knew its first flourishing and it enjoyed great fame because of the presence of great scholars such as Adriaan of Utrecht - Pope Adrianus VI -, Erasmus, Vives and Mercator. The presence of researchers of worldstature, is a tradition that still stands today.

In its history of nearly six centuries, the university of Leuven also knew some periods of misfortune. In 1797, the university was closed by the French government. In 1817, the university reopend as a state university, under impulse of the Dutch king. The University became the Catholic University again in 1835. The Faculty of Medicine remained successful in attracting valuable scientists such as Theodor Schwann, professor in anatomy and embryology from 1839 to 1848, who introduced the cellular theory. This century, during both world wars, a large area of Leuven and a lot of university buildings were destroyed. The University Library was even partially destroyed twice.

In 1911 Dutch has been used for the education at the university. From 1936 on, most lectures were given parallelly in Dutch and in French. 1968 was the year of the division of the K.U.Leuven into two independent universities, which became independent by law in 1970. The Dutch-speaking K.U.Leuven remained in Leuven and the French-speaking Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL) moved to Louvain-la-Neuve in Ottignies. The official language of the K.U.Leuven is Dutch, but considering the international significance of the university, numerous lectures, mostly postgraduate, and seminars are given in English and some even in other languages.

Since 1965, the K.U.Leuven also has a campus in Kortrijk (West-Flanders). At the K.U.L.A.K. the candidatures for four faculties are offered. Initially only for the Faculty of Arts (Philosophy, Classical Philology, Modern History, Romance Philology and Germanic Philology) and the Faculty of Law (Law), but since 1971 also for the Faculty of Medicine (Medicine) and the Faculty of Sciences (Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry) and since 1991 - in cooperation with the U.F.S.I.A. - Applied Economical Sciences.

Even centuries ago, the interest existed in the medical faculties to teach at the bedside of the patient. In Leuven, the Faculty of Medicine orginized practical medical education in the Sint-Pieter hospital, founded in 1080, from 1426. In the period inbetween the two world wars, several 'hospitals' were built, that later would form the Sint-Rafaël hospital. In fact, it was an attempt to provide medical care with Dutch-speaking professors, in addition to the services that were provided in the Sint-Pieter hospital with mainly French-speaking staff. This was also the intent when in 1958 in Pellenberg, the sanatorium Sint-Barbara was brought into use and was converted later into a hospital. Due to the division in 1968, the U.C.L would get its own new academical hospital in Sint-Lambrechts-Woluwe, while the academic hospitals in Leuven would become totally Dutch-speaking. Against the background of a long term planning, the decision was made to build a highly specialized academic hospital outside of the city centre, to replace the antiquated Sint-Rafaël.

And so Gasthuisberg was built, according to a totally new concept, directed at the integration of the different medical and paramedical disciplines and oriented at an accurate, but humane functioning. The walls were built around the functions and not the other way round. In January 1985, the University Hospital Gasthuisberg was opened. After the partial move, the U.Z. Pellenberg became a polyvalent centre for revalidation.

The U.Z. Leuven offer integrated and permanently available cares in prevention, diagnosis, treatment and revalidation. Characteristic for the U.Z. Leuven is the strong multidisciplinary cooperation and the interaction with other hospitals, the external physician-specialist, the general practitioner, the home nursing, etc. in function of the provision of services for the patient and the continuity of the care. The deanery of the faculty has moved into Gasthuisberg Research and Development II starting from November 2005.