Starkenburg

Beside the cities of Darmstadt and Offenbach, it consists of the modern districts (kreise): The area comprises about 2,600 square kilometres (1,000 sq mi), roughly equivalent to the German state of Saarland.

Starkenburg Castle was erected about 1065 to protect the estates around Lorsch Abbey, which itself were held by the Prince-Archbishopric of Mainz from the 13th century onwards.

Upon the German mediatisation of 1803, the southern territories of the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt—including the former Mainz lands on the Bergstraße—were incorporated into the newly established Principality (from 1816: Province) of Starkenburg.

Today the Starkenburg Economic Development Agency run in cooperation with the Darmstadt chamber of commerce as a registered association coordinates the efforts of the government units in marketing the region to technology companies.

Among the main issues are the development within the Frankfurt Rhine-Main metropolitan area and the construction of the Frankfurt–Mannheim high-speed railway.