STARGARD  , a

town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Pomerania, situated on the left bank of the navigable Ihna, 20 M . E. of Stettin on the railway to Danzig and at the junction of lines to Posen, Schneidemuhl and Custrin . Pop . (19o5), 26,908 . Formerly a member of the Hanseatic League, the town retains memorials of its early importance in the large church of St Mary, built in the 14th century, the 16th-century town-hall, and some gateways and towers dating from the 14th century . The walls which formerly surrounded it have been mostly converted into promenades . Extensive new law-courts and three large barracks are among the modern buildings . Stargard has a considerable market for cattle and horses, and carries on trade in grain, spirits and raw produce . Its manufactures include cigars, tobacco, wadding and stockings; and there are also iron-foundries, and linen and woollen factories in the town . Stargard, mentioned as having been destroyed by the Poles in 1120, received civic rights in 1229, and became the capital of eastern Pomerania . As a Hanseatic town it enjoyed consider-able commercial prosperity, but it had also to undergo siege and capture in the middle ages and during the Thirty Years' War . In 18x7 it was taken by Schill .

The name Stargard (from the

Slavonic Starogad or Starigrod, meaning " old town ") is common to several other towns in the north of Germany, of which the chief are Preussisch-Stargard, near Danzig, and Stargard an der Linde in Mecklenburg-Strelitz . See Zuck, Fiihrer durch Stargard (Stargard, 1900) .