FORMATION OF STATEHOOD AND LAW ON THE TERRITORY OF MODERN UKRAINE IN ANCIENT TIMES
Authors: Boyko Ihor 
Published: August 2022

The preconditions for the formation of statehood and law on the territory of modern Ukraine in ancient times are analyzed. The place and role of ancient states and the right to the territory of Ukraine in the centuries-old history of nation-building are determined. Emphasis is placed on the fact that in the first millennium BC, the lands of modern Ukraine were inhabited by various ethnic communities, peoples, tribes, waves of numerous nomads who came into contact with each other, influenced economic, social, cultural development, including the early Slavic population of the Middle Dnieper. It is shown that an important role in this process of mutual influence and enrichment was played by the state formations that were formed at this time on the territory of Ukraine: the Scythian state, the Greek city-states of the Northern Black Sea coast, the Bosporus Kingdom. It is noted that stable economic and political relations between these state centers and militant steppes, as well as farmers of the Ukrainian Polissya and Forest-Steppe arose and developed, which in turn required legal regulation of civil and other legal relations. It is emphasized that at that time the elements of norms and institutions of legal regulation of civil, criminal and procedural relations are emerging and developing. An important place in the formation of legal regulation of social relations in the Ukrainian lands in the period under study was played by the highly developed Roman private law at that time. It is substantiated that a significant place in the history of the development of statehood and law on the territory of modern Ukraine in ancient times was occupied by the Slavs, who were first mentioned in written sources at the turn of our era. They were indigenous to Eastern Europe and lived here in the Early Iron Age. However, in historical sources of the time they were called Scythians. Yet, some researchers believe that the Scythians were Slavs. From the beginning of the 1st millennium BC, the Slavs appear in written sources under the name of the Venetians. According to the ancient authors, the Venetians occupied lands in the Vistula basin, from the northern slopes of the Carpathians to the Baltic, and were neighbors of the Germanic, Sarmatian and Finnish tribes. The entire northern and western parts of modern Ukraine at that time were inhabited by Slavic (Venetian) tribes. A bit later, along with the Venetians, two new names for written Slavs appeared in written sources: Antes and Sclaveni. Although the meaning and origin of these terms are still unclear, they are the first to reflect the division of the Slavs into Western (Sclaveni) and Eastern (Antes). The latter lived on lands between the Dnieper and the Dniester, their territory also covered the Left Bank of the Dnieper. In fact, researchers consider Antes-Slavs to be the first reliable ancestors of Ukrainians. Thus, a well-known ethnologist and archaeologist, professor with a world authority U.V. Shcherbakovsky (1856–1957) believed that the name «antes» was called a group of Ukrainian tribes, and the Antes, according to M. Hrushevsky (natives of Trypillia tribes), were the ancestors of Ukrainians. The process of state formation of the Ants did not find its end. The Slavic-Avar wars, in which the Antes took an active part, led to the beginning of the 7th century. before the collapse of the Antes state. Under the blows of the Avars, the state of Antes ceased to exist in 602. It is noted that the most active state-building processes in the Ukrainian lands in the early Middle Ages took place in the 8th – 9th centuries which resulted in the formation of the Kyivan-Rus’ state – Ukraine-Rus’ with its center in Kyiv.