Johann Kaspar Bluntschli

Johann Kaspar Bluntschli (born March 7, 1808, Zürich—died Oct. 21, 1881, Karlsruhe, Ger.) was a writer on international law, whose book Das moderne Kriegsrecht (1866; “The Modern Law of War”) was the basis of the codification of the laws of war that were enacted at the Hague conferences of 1899 and 1907. Bluntschli studied law at Zürich, Berlin, and Bonn and taught at Zürich, Munich (from 1848), and Heidelberg (from 1861). In 1873 he helped to found the Institute of International Law.

Das moderne Kriegsrecht was largely taken from the code prepared by Francis Lieber (1863) for the Federal Army in the U.S. Civil War. Bluntschli’s next major work, Das moderne Völkerrecht (1868; “Modern International Law”), presented an apparently comprehensive code that was translated into several languages and became a widely used reference book for diplomatists. Lehre vom modernen Staat, 3 vol. (1875–76; “Lessons of the Modern State”), which was translated into English and French, is considered by some to be his finest work.