The university is the oldest institution[citation needed] of higher learning in continuous operation in present-day Ukraine, dating from 1661 when John II Casimir, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, granted it its first royal charter.

Over the centuries, it has undergone various transformations, suspensions, and name changes that have reflected the geopolitical complexities of this part of Europe.

Establishing another seat of learning in the Kingdom of Poland was seen as a threat by the authorities of Kraków's Jagiellonian University, which did not want a rival and stymied the Jesuits' plans for the following years.

In 1758, King-Grand Duke Augustus III issued a decree, which described the Collegium as an academy, equal in fact status to the Jagiellonian University, with two faculties, those of Theology and Philosophy.

In 1773 the Suppression of the Society of Jesus by Rome (Dominus ac Redemptor) was soon followed by the partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth which meant that the university was excluded from the Commission of National Education reform.

On 21 October 1784, the Austrian Emperor Joseph II signed an act of foundation of a secular university.

Literary Slaveno-Rusyn (Ruthenian/Ukrainian) of the period had been used in the Studium Ruthenium (1787–1809), a special institute of the university for educating candidates for the Uniate (Greek-Catholic) priesthood.

The government in Vienna answered with force, and on 2 November 1848, the centre of the city was shelled by the troops led by General Hammerstein striking the buildings of the university, especially its library.

After a few years the Austrians relented and on 4 July[citation needed] 1871 Vienna declared Polish and Ruthenian (Ukrainian) as the official languages at the university.

The Austrian authorities declared Polish as the main teaching medium with Ruthenian and German as auxiliary.

In 1908, a Ruthenian student of the philosophy faculty, Miroslaw Siczynski, had assassinated the Polish governor of Galicia, Andrzej Kazimierz Potocki.

Its professors were famous across Europe, with such renowned names as Wladyslaw Abraham, Oswald Balzer, Szymon Askenazy, Stanislaw Zakrzewski, Zygmunt Janiszewski, Kazimierz Twardowski, Benedykt Dybowski, Marian Smoluchowski and Ludwik Rydygier.

In July 1912, they met with their Jewish counterpart branch to discuss the representation of women in the student body of the university.

It was one of the most influential scholarly institutions of the Second Polish Republic, notable for its schools of mathematics (Stefan Banach, Hugo Steinhaus), logics (Kazimierz Twardowski), history and law (Oswald Balzer), anthropology (Jan Czekanowski), and geography (Eugeniusz Romer).

[12][6][15] The university's library acquired, among others, the collection of Witold Kazimierz Czartoryski [pl] and 1,300 old Polish books from the 16th and 17th century, previously belonging to Józef Koziebrodzki.

In the 1934/35 academic year, the breakdown of the student body was as follows: Altogether, during the academic year 1934/35, there were 5900 students at the university, consisting by religious observance of: Ukrainian professors were required to take a formal oath of allegiance to Poland; most of them refused and left the university in the early 1920s.

[21] Polish professors and administrative assistants were increasingly fired[13][19] and replaced by cadres specializing in Marxism, Leninism, political economics, as well as Ukrainian and Soviet literature, history, and geography.

[13] After Lviv was occupied by the Nazi Germany in June 1941, the Germans closed the University of Ivan Franko[13] and killed over 20 Polish professors (as well as members of their households and guests, increasing the total number of victims to above forty).

[7] Professor, Doctor Ivan Vakarchuk, a renowned scholar in the field of theoretical physics, was rector of the university from 1990 to 2013.

The Zoological, Geological, Mineralogical Museums together with those of Numismatics, Sphragistics, and Archeology are stimulating the interests of students.

Many graduates continue their studies in higher education institutions in the United States, Poland, Germany, Austria, Britain, and France.

The university, with the financial support of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, has a national contact point of the EU Framework Program "Horizon 2020" in the thematic areas "Future and latest technologies" and "Inclusive, innovative and smart society".