Marius Buning

Marius Buning is Professor of European History at the Department of Historical and Classical Studies, Faculty of Humanities, University of Oslo. He holds a Ph.D. from the European University Institute (2013) and has held prestigious fellowships at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies, the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, and the Dahlem Humanities Center at Freie Universität Berlin. Since 2022, he has served as Principal Investigator (PI) of the ERC-funded project Before Copyright: Printing Privileges and the Politics of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe.

His academic interests converge at the intersection of the history of knowledge, legal studies, and social history. He is particularly focused on how intellectual property rights—such as patents, copyrights, and trademarks—have influenced the legitimacy of scientific and scholarly claims in political and societal contexts. His work spans early modern to contemporary European history, with deep engagement in legal history, book history, the history of science and technology, and the history of political thought.

The 15 most recent articles reflect a consistent trajectory in the historical development of knowledge regulation, emphasizing printing privileges, authorship, state control, and the evolution of copyright. These works span disciplines including legal history, book history, digital humanities, and political thought, with recurring sub-fields such as knowledge economies, legal pluralism, print culture, and scholarly authority.

He is actively involved in the Primary Sources on Copyright (1450–1900) project and maintains a public scholarly profile via Zenodo and ORCID (0000-0003-1108-840X). While no specific awards are listed, his ERC grant signifies major recognition in the European research community.

Buning welcomes prospective students interested in European history, particularly those exploring the history of knowledge, legal history, cultural history, or political thought. His supervisory role is integral to his academic profile. He leads the Before Copyright (BE4COPY) project and is part of the History of Capitalism research group at the University of Oslo, indicating active collaboration and team-based research.

His research is institutionally supported through the ERC grant, and his future work is likely to expand on the digitization and comparative analysis of early modern legal texts related to knowledge production. His lab or research team is centered around the BE4COPY project, involving digital archiving, source criticism, and interdisciplinary collaboration in legal and historical scholarship.