this

work he was strongly influenced by the bitter, violent political struggles both

in his own country and in Europe more broadly, particularly the 

,

which had broken out in 1618. Grotius sought to achieve his practical objective

to minimize bloodshed in wars by constructing a general theory of 

) that would restrain and

regulate war between various independent powers, including states. Grotius’s masterpiece has been

most influential in the area of international law. Its general normative

framework provided a foundation to 

 states, which became the basic units of modern international

society.