Starostvo

Starostvo. An administrative-territorial and economic unit of state lands in medieval Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and their Ukrainian and Belarusian territories. It usually included one or more cities or towns and some villages and was administered by a starosta, who was a high official of noble birth. In Western Ukraine under Austrian (1772–1918) and Polish (1919–39) rule, the starostvo was equivalent to a county.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]