The Ruthenian Voivodeship, also called Rus’ voivodeship, was a voivodeship of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland from 1434 until the 1772 First Partition of Poland with a center in the city of Lviv. Together with a number of other voivodeships of southern and eastern part of the Kingdom of Poland, it formed Lesser Poland Province, with its capital city in Kraków. Following the Partitions of Poland, most of Ruthenian Voivodeship, except for its northeastern corner, was annexed by the Habsburg monarchy, as part of the province of Galicia. Today, the former Ruthenian Voivodeship is divided between Poland and Ukraine.
Lwów, capital of the voivodeship, in the 17th century
A voivodeship or voivodate is the area administered by a voivode (governor) in several countries of central and eastern Europe. Voivodeships have existed since medieval times and the area of extent of voivodeship resembles that of a duchy in western medieval states, much as the title of voivode was equivalent to that of a duke. Other roughly equivalent titles and areas in medieval Eastern Europe included ban and banate.
The voivodeships of Wallachia and Moldavia in the 14th century