Project

(image generated with Artificial Intelligence)

TREATYLAB investigates the 'labyrinth of treaties', or the legal advice produced in the French foreign office (bureaux des affaires étrangères), from the War of the Spanish Succession (1713) to the end of the Seven Years' War (1756-1763) by Nicolas-Louis Le Dran, top civil servant (premier commis). We digitise over a hundred thousands folios conserved in the Archives diplomatiques (Ministère de l'Europe et des Affaires Étrangères) (WP1), and render them accessible to the public at large (WP2-WP4), using the unique expertise of a dedicated external partner. At the same time, a team consisting of a PI, a postdoc and three PhD candidates will investigate four main themes within this consistent dataset (WP3). An interdisciplinary open access collective volume will disseminate research results at the end of the project (WP5). 

(image generated using XMind and Artificial Intelligence)

The conflicts (or episodes of belligerence and neutrality) in this 50 year-period are of course an essential contextual backdrop to the production of Le Dran's memoranda. Yet, they treat thematic and diachronous topics (e.g. fundamental laws, succession, trade and navigation, sovereignty, wars and mediation), stretching from the Americas to the Oural, or from Scandinavia to Africa. His writings are classified in the fund Mémoires & Documents according to geographical pertinence. In many cases, this institutional record-keeping has to be nuanced and complemented. 

(places mentioned in AMAE, MD, France, vol. 251; image generated using Google Maps and Artificial Intelligence)

During the project’s 60 months, eight milestone seminars will be organised, uniting the project team with experts in public international law, legal history and early modern history, as well as Digital Humanities specialists.

TREATYLAB is based at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, and hosted by the Research Group Contextual Research in Law (Faculty of Law and Criminology). CORE is a regular research group recognised by the VUB's Research Council, and unites historians of public and private law with scholars of legal theory and philosophy of law. The project is generously funded by the European Union's European Research Council (Panel SH2), through the 2025 ERC Consolidator Grant call (2025-COG-101230242).



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PhD Vacancies published (DEADLINE 8 JUL 2026)

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(image generated with Artificial Intelligence) Three full-time PhD vacancies have been published on the VUB academic vacancies website . Candidates with a master’s degree in law or history may apply for all positions. The formal notices should be read together with the more detailed thematic description of each position  here . PhD1: 'They Called it Peace ? The Use of Force and the Cycle of Truces, 1712-1763' ( here ) PhD2: 'The Latin and Atlantic Bond ? Bourbon Law of Nations in Europe and America, 1712-1763' ( here ) PhD3: 'Doctrine and Practice: Early Enlightenment Doctrine and Practical Legal Writing, 1712-1763' ( here ) The deadline for candidacies is 8 July 2026 , with an expected starting date on 1 October 2026 .
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Welcome

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(image generated with Artificial Intelligence) We are happy to present the ERC Consolidator Grant TREATYLAB ("The Labyrinth of Treaties, 1712-1763. International Law Behind the Scenes of Early Enlightenment Diplomacy, 1712-1763"). This project does not create a "lab" in the sense of a laboratory. Neither does it focus on treaties. We investigate the legal advisory work produced in the bureaux des affaires étrangères  under Louis XV, using over a hundred thousands of folios attributed to top civil servant Nicolas-Louis Le Dran (1687-1774) . Le Dran’s lifetime is grosso modo  that of Enlightened natural law, stretching from Hugo Grotius’ De iure belli ac pacis libri tres  (1625) and Samuel von Pufendorf De iure naturae et gentium libri octo  (1672) -both translated and annotated by Jean Barbeyrac- to Montesquieu’s De l’Esprit des Loix  (1748), Adam Friedrich Glafey’s Vernunft- und Völckerrecht  (1723), Cornelis van Bynkershoek’s Quaestionum Iuris Publici Libr...
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