Belarusian social and political activist and historian. The first President of the Belarusian Academy of Sciences (1929–1930). Academician of the Belarusian Academy of Sciences (1928), the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences (1929). V. M. Ignatovsky was born in the village of Tokari, Kamenets district, Brest region. He received primary education in the Vilna High School, he was expelled from for participation in youth revolutionary actions. He continued education in the Mogilev Seminary. Following graduation form the Seminary in 1902, he entered the Faculty of History and Philology of the St. Petersburg University. As a result of his participation in anti-government demonstrations, he was twice expelled from the university.
In 1908 V. M. Ignatovsky entered the Yuriev (Tartu) University. In 1911, after graduating from that University, he found a job at a private school in the city of Vilna. From 1914 till 1920 V. M. Ignatovsky headed the Teachers’ Institute in Minsk. In 1915 he founded a cultural and educational organization «Nash kray» («Our Land»). In 1917 «Nash kray» was transformed into the organization «Maladaya Belarus» («Young Belarus»). In 1917 V. M. Ignatovsky was a member of the Central Committee of the Belarusian Socialist Hramada, in 1918 – a member of the Central Committee of the Belarusian Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries. During the Polish occupation, in January 1920, the scientist created the Belarusian Communist organization on the basis of «Maladaya Belarus». July 31, 1920, as the chairman of the Belarusian Communist organization, V. M. Ignatovsky participated in the signing of the «Declaration of the Independence of the Soviet Socialist Republic of Belarus». Since August 1920 he was a member of the Military Revolutionary Committee of the BSSR and People’s Commissar for Agriculture of the BSSR, from 1920 to 1926 – People’s Commissar for Education of the BSSR. In 1920s he was a member of the USSR Central Executive Committee, the BSSR Central Executive Committee and its Presidium, the Bureau of the Communist Party of Bolsheviks of Belarus.
V. M. Ignatovsky played a considerable role in the policy of belarusization, as well as in solving the problem of integration of the BSSR. He also facilitated the return of the Belarusian emigration to the BSSR.
Since 1921 V. M. Ignatovsky was the Professor, Dean and Vice-Rector of the BSU. In 1925 he was elected as the Chairman (from 1927 – President) of the Institute of Belarusian Culture. From 1929 to 1930 he headed the Belarusian Academy of Sciences and its Institute of History. In the BSU he lectured on the History of Belarus, based on the conception of K. Marx.
Historical research works by V. M. Ignatovsky, published in 1921–1927, were written in the period of author’s transition from revolutionary democracy to ideological positions of Marxism-Leninism. December 26, 1930 he was dismissed from the post of the President of the Belarusian Academy of Sciences, due to the campaign against the so-called «National Democratism»; on January 16, 1931, the Central Committee excluded him from the Communist Party of Bolsheviks of Belarus. As «kulaks’ agent», within the so-called case «Union of Liberation of Belarus» he undergone numerous interrogations by the OGPU. Those questionings caused V. M. Ignatovsky to commit suicide on February 4, 1931.
V. M. Ignatovsky was the author of about 40 scientific and journalistic articles, 8 monographs. His scientific papers were the basis for the formation of the national concept of Belarusian history in view of Marxist-Leninist methodology. He introduced the periodization of Belarusian history, based on state allegiance. Subsequent generations of historians have followed this periodization. V. M. Ignatovsky’s study «1863 in Belarus» became the foundation for further development of the Belarusian historiography on the issue of uprising of 1863–1864.
