was a historian, ethnographer, and diplomat of Belarusian origin. He hailed from the family of land-less smaller nobility and was the son of Collegiate Secretary. He was the author of more than 150 works on the history of Kievan Rus', Muscovy, 19th-century Russia, Lithuania and Belarus, on the social-political movement, peasants' question and the ethnography of Belarus.
Education
He graduated from Kiev University in 1893.He wrote a magister dissertation on history in Fall 1901 and a doctoral dissertation on history in 1906. He became Professor at Moscow University (1899) and professor of Russian history at Kiev University in 1902.
Career
He was the organiser and director of the Higher Commercial Courses[4] (Kiev, 1906), one of the organizers and the first head of the South-Western Branch of the Russian Exports Chamber (1912), and head of several popular-scientific circles and societies in Kiev.
His first monographes showed outstanding abilities of the author. In the 1907-1917 years he served as a Princiipal of the Kiev Institute of Commerce. In 1918, he headed the Belarusian Chamber of Commerce in Kiev. He actively supported the creation of the Belarusian National Republic (BNR).
In 1922 Dovnar-Zapolskiy moved to Baku, where he was rector of the University, the Head of Industry and Trade of the People's Commissariat of Trade and Industry of Azerbaijan SSR. In 1925, he moved to Minsk. He worked as a professor of history at the Faculty of Education of Belarus, professor of economy at the Faculty of Management and Law BSU. Since the autumn of 1925 created the State Planning Committee headed by publishing department. In August 1925, the scientist has been appointed head of the historical and archaeological commission of the Institute of Belarusian Culture.
Politics
He participated in then-illegal movements of the 1880s . Dovnar-Zapol'skiy actively supported the Belarusian People's Republic (BPR)