Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Ukrainian. (January 2018) Click [show] for important translation instructions. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Ukrainian Wikipedia article at [[:uk:Конституція Пилипа Орлика]]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template {{Translated|uk|Конституція Пилипа Орлика}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

The Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk (Ukrainian: Конституція Пилипа Орлика, romanized: Konstytutsiia Pylypa Orlyka), formally titled as The Treaties and Resolutions of the Rights and Freedoms of the Zaporozhian Army (Latin: Pacta et Constitutiones legum libertatumque Exercitus Zaporoviensis, Ukrainian: Договори і Постановлення Прав і вольностей Війська Запорозького, romanized: Dohovory i Postanovlennia Prav i volʹnostei Viisʹka Zaporozʹkoho), is a constitutional document written by the Hetman of the Zaporizhian Host, Pylyp Orlyk,^[1] the Cossack elders and the Cossacks of the Zaporozhian Army on the 5 April 1710 in the city of Bender (Tighina) in the Principality of Moldavia. It is sometimes called the first constitution of Ukraine.^[2][3]

It established the principle of the separation of powers in government between the legislative, executive, and judiciary branches well before the publication of Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws. The document limited the executive authority of the hetman, and established a Cossack parliament called the General Council [uk] (General Rada).

The Old Ukrainian-language original, signed by Orlyk, accompanied by a diploma signed by King Charles XII of Sweden was found in 2008 by Ukrainian researchers in the Russian State Archive of Ancient Acts [ru], Moscow.^[4] The Latin-language original is kept in the National Archives of Sweden.