Denis Zubrytsky

Denys Ivanovych Zubrytsky (, ; 1777 – January 16, 1862), was the first Ukrainian historian in Galicia and a major early figure in the Galician Russophile movement.

Life

Denis Zubrytsky was born in 1777 into a family of Ukrainian nobles. After graduating from Lviv's gymnazium in 1795, he worked as a civil servant. In his youth. he had been pro-Polish, and had even supported Napoleon's invasion of Austria-Hungary; in 1809 he served as a secretary to the pro-French Polish forces who occupied the city. Later in his life, Zubrytsky became very hostile to Polish interests and an ardent supporter of Russophilism. Between 1829 and 1847, he held various positions within the Stauropegion Institute, an important cultural and historical institution in western Ukraine that served as a bastion of Russophilism. He became a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Archeological Commission in 1842, and a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1855. In 1843, he was commissioned to organize the Lviv municipal archive.