page_title: Western Pomerania
section_title: Swedish (1630/48–1720/1815) and Prussian province (1720/1815–1945)
hierarchical_section_title: Western Pomerania / History / Swedish (1630/48–1720/1815) and Prussian province (1720/1815–1945)
caption_attribution_description: English: Pomerania in 1653
context_page_description: Western Pomerania, also called Hither Pomerania, is the western extremity of the historic region of the Duchy, later Province of Pomerania, nowadays divided between the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Poland.
  The name Pomerania comes from Slavic po more, which means "land by the sea". The adjective for the region is Pomeranian, inhabitants are called Pomeranians.
  Forming part of the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, Western Pomerania's boundaries have changed through the centuries and it belonged to countries such as Poland, Sweden, Denmark, and Prussia. Before 1945, it embraced the whole area of Pomerania west of the Oder River. Today the cities of Szczecin, Świnoujście and Police are part of Poland, with the remainder of the region staying part of Germany. German Vorpommern now forms about one-third of the present-day north-eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
  German Western Pomerania had a population of about 470,000 in 2012 - while the Polish districts of the region had a population of about 520,000 in 2012. So overall, about 1 million people live in the historical region of Western Pomerania today, while the Szczecin agglomeration reaches even further.
context_section_description: Pomerania came under Swedish military control in 1630 during the Thirty Years' War. Swedish sovereignty over Vorpommern, including Stettin, was confirmed by the Peace of Westphalia (1648) and the Treaty of Stettin (1653), and from that time onwards much of the region formed Swedish Pomerania. Possession of this region remained an issue of conflict in European politics and Swedish rule was a period marked by the ravages of warfare.
  A part of the region south of the Peene river (Old Western Pomerania or Altvorpommern) came under Prussian sovereignty after the Stockholm peace treaty in 1720. Under the Treaty of Kiel, the remnants of Swedish Pomerania (New Western Pomerania or Neuvorpommern) were briefly transferred to Denmark in 1814, but the 1815 Congress of Vienna ceded the territory to Prussia.
  From 1815, all of Western Pomerania was integrated into the Prussian Province of Pomerania, administered as the Region of Stralsund (New Western Pomerania) and Region of Stettin (the old Western Pomeranian region). Stralsund was fused into Stettin in 1932.
caption: The former Duchy of Pomerania (center) partitioned between the Swedish Empire and Brandenburg after the Treaty of Stettin (1653). Swedish Pomerania (Western Pomerania) is indicated in light blue, Brandenburgian Pomerania (East Pomerania) is shown in orange.
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