Jazep Jucho

Jazep Jucho (19 March 1921 - 29 July 2004; also known as Iosif Jucho, ) was a prominent Belarusian lawyer, historian and writer and a leading Belarusian authority on the laws of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

Early years and career

Jucho was born in Minsk into a large working-class family on 19 March 1921. He finished a local school in 1938 and enrolled in a polytechnic.Памяць і слава: Іосіф Аляксандравіч Юхо. Да 90-годдзя з дня нараджэння
emory and Glory: Josif Aliaksandravič Jucho/ Рэдкал.: С.А. Балашэнка і інш. Мінск: БДУ, 2011

However in 1939 he was conscripted into the Red Army and finished World War II as a decorated Soviet major having been wounded in action.

After the war, Jucho completed graduate and post-graduate studies at the Minsk Law Institute and the Belarusian Academy of Sciences. For most of his career he worked in different positions at the Law Department of the Belarusian State University.

He became “the founder of the academic studies of the history of the Belarusian state and law” in Soviet Belarus.Арлоў, Уладзімер (2020). ''
МЁНЫ СВАБОДЫ (Бібліятэка Свабоды. ХХІ стагодзьдзе.)
' 'Uładzimir Arłou. The Names of Freedom (The Library of Freedom. ХХІ century.)''">Uładzimir_Arłou.html" ;"title="'Uładzimir Arłou">'Uładzimir Arłou. The Names of Freedom (The Library of Freedom. ХХІ century.)''(in Belarusian) (4-е выд., дап. ed.). Радыё Свабодная Эўропа / Радыё Свабода - Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. pp. 518-519

During Gorbachev’s Perestroika, Jucho actively participated in the Belarusian national revival movement - see Belarusian democracy movement, Belarusian Democracy Movement.

He took part in the drafting of the 1994 Belarusian Constitution and other legislative acts of newly independent Belarus.

Leading authority on Grand Duchy of Lithuania laws

In 1963 Jucho began studying the period of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (of which Belarus was part) - something he would continue for the rest of his career. He prepared a course of lectures on the subject and researched the origin of the Statutes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, a 16th-century codification of the legislation of the Grand Duchy written in the Ruthenian language">Grand_Duchy_of_Lithuania.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Grand Duchy written in the Ruthenian language (precursor to modern Belarusian language">Belarusian).

The topic of his PhD dissertation in 1980 was “The Socio-Political Order and Rights in Belarus in the 16th century” ().

Jucho explored political and jurisprudential ideas of Francysk Skaryna">Francis Skaryna