Pomerania

Pomerania (Pol., Pomorze; German, Pommern), former maritime province of Prussia, on the Baltic Sea. Following the defeat of Germany in World War II, Pomerania was partitioned into two areas divided by the River Oder. The part of Pomerania west of the Oder was included in the new state of Mecklenburg, in the Soviet Zone of Occupation (later East Germany—1949-1990). With German unification in 1990, this area became part of the German state of Mecklenburg-West Pomerania. The territory east of the river, comprising most of Pomerania, was placed under Polish administration pending the final peace settlement with Germany; the territory was formally ceded to Poland by the terms of an agreement reached in 1970.

The region called Pomerania during the Middle Ages was the Baltic coast territory between the Wisła and the Oder, inhabited around ad 600 by the Pomerani (Pomorzanie), a Slavic tribe. The frontier was gradually moved west, as the area was conquered by the Teutonic Knights, and the district between the Wisła and Prośnica rivers became known as Pomerellen, a part of Poland (see Baltic Crusades). By the Peace of Westphalia (1648), ending the Thirty Years' War, Pomerania was partitioned between Brandenburg and Sweden. Brandenburg (after 1701, the kingdom of Prussia) received part of Swedish Pomerania in 1720 and annexed Pomerellen in 1772. In 1815 the Congress of Vienna united all of Pomerania under Prussia.