Since his appointment in 1873 as a professor of international law at the University of Petersburg and his work in the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Martens was Russia’s most influential specialist in international law. He witnessed the reign of three successive czars and lectured during disturbing revolutionary times. Martens was a member of the examination commission before which Lenin had to appear in Petersburg.
Martens developed a novel system of international law and his own theory of international administration. There was no systematic Russian doctrine in international law before the 19th century. His publications and his activities as arbitrator in many interstate disputes brought him fame throughout the world.
Elucidating articles about the writings and actions of Martens are from A. Nussbaum and H. Wehberg. The Martens biography by V.V.Poustogarov sheds a fascinating light on Martens.
F.F. Martens has left many footprints in The Hague. His name is forever connected with this “Legal Capital of the World”. In 1893 he was the representative of the Russian government at the First Hague Conference on Private International law, as well at the second, the third and the fourth. His finest hour came in 1899 when he participated in the preparation and conducting of the First Peace Conference convoked at The Hague in 1899. Although G.G. Staal, the Russian envoy in London, was the head of the Russian delegation, it was Martens who was the soul of the conference, who worked zealously in the important commissions. He earned the praise of such distinguished scholars as H. Wehberg, H. Lammasch, A.P.S. van Karnebeek, T. M. C. Asser and L. Bourgeois. He had drawn up the program for the conference and succeeded in transforming the meeting from a conference on disarmament into a Peace conference. It was a complete success for Russian diplomacy.
His name is forever linked with “the Martens Clause”, first included in the Hague Conventions of 1899:

Until a more complete code of the laws of war is issued, the High Contracting Parties think it right to declare that in cases not included in the Regulations adopted by them, populations and belligerents remain under the protection and empire of the principles of international law, as they result from the usages established between civilized nations, from the laws of humanity and the requirements of the public conscience.

The International Court of Justice referred to this clause in its Advisory Opinion on 8 July 1996 in the Peace Palace in the Hague in the Case of the “Legality of the threat or use of nuclear weapons”
The Peace Palace itself owes its existence partly to Martens. He suggested to Andrew Carnegie to build a Palace in The Hague for the Permanent Court of Arbitration, when the American millionaire wanted to make a large donation in support of the idea of peace among peoples. Martens was present at the laying of the first stone of the Peace Palace in 1907.
The Peace Palace Library has the Russian edition of Martens’ thesis O konsoulakh i konsoulskoï iourisdiktsii na vostokïe, a classical work on consular jurisdiction in the Far and Near East, published in Petersburg in 1873. It was purchased for 40 Deutsch Reichsmark in 1929 from a bookseller in Germany. His main work, Le droit contemporain des nations civilisées (in Russian, Petersburg 1882-83) came into the possession of the library in 1929.
Of course his famous 15 volumes collection of Russian treaties concluded with foreign powers is a vital part of the treaty section of the international law collection. (Not to be confused with the other treaty series of G.F Martens, 1756-1821, and Ch. Martens, 1790-1863, the progenitors of the collections of international treaties). The Russian treaties publication was one of the first acquisitions of the library in 1913.
In commemoration of his prominent role at the First Hague Peace Conference a bronze bust of Martens was presented to the Peace Palace in 1999. In Petersburg the “Third Peace Conference” took place, also to honor this great Russian, and the book A Centenary of Russian initiative: From the First Peace Conference of 1899 to the Third Peace Conference of 1999 was published, a collection of documents edited by V.S. Ivanienko. The publication collects for the first time all the documents relating to the First Hague Peace Conference, including the papers and diaries of Martens.

Sources
H. Wehberg, "Friedrich v. Martens und die Haager Friedenskonferenzen", XX Zeitschrift für internationales Recht, 1910, pp. 343-357.
A. Nussbaum, "Frédéric de Martens, Representative Tsarist Writer on International Law", XXII Acta Scandinavia juris gentium (in: Nordisk Tidsskrift for International Law) 1952, pp. 51-66.
V.V. Poustogarov, Our Martens. F.F.Martens, International Lawyer and Architect of Peace, Kluwer Law International, 2000.
A. Eyffinger, The Peace Palace: Residence for Justice, Domicile of Learning. The Hague Carnegie Foundation, 1988.
A. Eyffinger, A Tribute to Martens. 2004. (forthcoming)
J. Kross. Le départ du professeur Martens. Roman traduit de l’Estonien. Paris, 1990.