Switzerland, layer by layer.

A history lesson in nine parts, from the Neanderthals of the Jura to the nine million people of today. Each part builds on the one before. As you scroll, the map fills with places, and from 1291 the cantons join one by one.

Dates before about 1300 are approximate; many come from archaeology. Legends are marked as legends. Corrections are welcome: contact@afroswissters.ch.

Who lived here →All 26 cantons →

Lesson 01over 40,000 years ago – 800 BCE

Ice, hunters and the first farmers

Ice came and went for hundreds of thousands of years. Neanderthals hunted in the Jura and the Alps; after the last glaciation, modern humans followed the reindeer, and from about 5500 BCE farmers brought fields, cattle and pottery. Villages grew on lake shores, and people crossed high passes long before there were roads.

9 entries

Cotencher cave

more than 40,000 years ago

In 1964, part of the upper jaw of a Neanderthal woman, about 40 years old, was found in this cave in the Areuse gorge. It is the most important Neanderthal find in Switzerland.

Today’s cantonsNeuchâtel

Sources1 17 18GlossaryPalaeolithic

Wildkirchli

c. 40,000 years ago

Caves high in the Alpstein, at about 1,500 metres, where Neanderthals stayed and cave bears hibernated. The excavator Emil Bächler (from 1903) imagined a cult of cave-bear hunters; research no longer accepts this.

Today’s cantonsAppenzell Innerrhoden

Sources1 17GlossaryPalaeolithic

The last glaciation

c. 24,000 years ago

At its height, glaciers from the Alps covered most of today’s Switzerland; the Rhône glacier reached the foot of the Jura. When the ice melted, it left behind the lakes and valleys of the Plateau.

Sources1 17GlossaryPlateau (Mittelland)

Kesslerloch

c. 15,000 – 11,000 years ago

Reindeer hunters camped in this cave near Thayngen in summer. Among the finds of the first excavation, in 1873, is the “grazing reindeer”, engraved on a piece of reindeer antler. Like all people outside Africa, these hunters descended from groups who had left Africa tens of thousands of years earlier.

Today’s cantonsSchaffhausen

In Africa, layer by layerShared ancestors ↗

Sources1 17 19GlossaryPalaeolithic

Champréveyres and Monruz

c. 13,000 BCE

Camps of Ice Age hunters on the shore of Lake Neuchâtel, excavated during motorway construction in the 1980s and 1990s. From Monruz comes a tiny pendant of jet shaped like a woman’s figure.

Today’s cantonsNeuchâtel

Sources1 17 24GlossaryPalaeolithic

Schnidejoch

from c. 4800 BCE

In the hot summer of 2003 a hiker found the first object below this pass at 2,756 metres. The melting ice has since released hundreds of objects spanning more than 6,000 years, among them a yew bow from about 2800 BCE and leather clothing: people crossed the Alps here whenever the glaciers retreated.

Today’s cantonsBern Valais

Sources1 20GlossaryBCE and CE

Pile dwellings

c. 4300 – 800 BCE

Villages on the shores of lakes and moors, many of them raised on piles. Tree rings date some houses to the exact year. 56 of the 111 sites of the UNESCO World Heritage “Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps” (2011) are in Switzerland. The first were noticed at Obermeilen on Lake Zürich in the winter of 1853–54.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Sources1 10 17 22 23GlossaryDendrochronology Pile dwelling

Deep dive

Background and institutions

When low water in the winter of 1853–54 exposed wooden piles at Obermeilen, the antiquarian Ferdinand Keller described “lake dwellings” on platforms over the water. Research based on tree rings and underwater excavation now shows villages of many forms, most of them on shores and moors that were flooded later. The 111 UNESCO sites are protected mostly under water and in the ground.

Critical reading

Keller’s lake dwellers quickly became national ancestors: peaceful, hard-working and shared by all cantons and languages, at a time when the young federal state needed a common past (Kaeser 2004). Paintings, school books and exhibitions spread the image. It tells us as much about the 19th century as about the Stone Age.

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
10Zimmer, Oliver (2003). A Contested Nation: History, Memory and Nationalism in Switzerland, 1761–1891. Scholarly book
17Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Ur- und Frühgeschichte (ed.) (1993–2005). Die Schweiz vom Paläolithikum bis zum frühen Mittelalter / La Suisse du Paléolithique à l’aube du Moyen-Âge (SPM), 6 vols. Reference work
22UNESCO World Heritage Centre (2011). Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps (no. 1363). Official record
23Kaeser, Marc-Antoine (2004). Les Lacustres. Archéologie et mythe national. Scholarly book

Petit-Chasseur, Sion

c. 2800 – 2200 BCE

A cemetery of stone tombs and carved stone slabs (stelae) showing people with belts, weapons and patterned clothing. Found during building work in 1961, it was used over many generations at the end of the Stone Age.

Today’s cantonsValais

Sources1 17 21GlossaryNeolithic

Newcomers from the steppe

from c. 2800 BCE

Ancient DNA from burials such as the dolmen of Oberbipp shows that people with ancestry from the steppes north of the Black Sea arrived from about 2800 BCE and mixed with the local farmers over almost a thousand years. The population here has always combined newcomers and earlier inhabitants.

Today’s cantonsBern

Sources1 6 21GlossaryBCE and CE Ancient DNA Neolithic

Carried forward

Copper and then bronze reached the Alps from the 3rd millennium BCE. Around 800 BCE iron came into use. Greek and Roman writers would later call the people living here Celts.

Next lesson →

Lesson 02c. 800 BCE – 401 CE

Celts, Raetians and Rome

Roman writers named the peoples here: the Helvetii on the Plateau, the Raurici near Basel, the Allobroges at Geneva, the Lepontii in Ticino, the Raetians in the eastern Alps. From 58 BCE Rome took control step by step. For four centuries the land was part of the empire, with towns, roads, estates, temples and, later, churches.

12 entries

The Grächwil jar

c. 570 BCE

A Greek bronze water jar decorated with a goddess between lions, hares and an eagle, made in a Greek workshop, probably in southern Italy, and buried in a chieftain’s grave north of Bern. Found in 1851, it shows how far luxuries travelled over the Alps.

Today’s cantonsBern

Sources1 17 27

La Tène

c. 450 BCE – Roman times

In 1857, swords, spears, brooches and tools were found in the shallows at the end of Lake Neuchâtel; more came to light when the lake level was lowered after 1868. The site gave its name to the La Tène culture, the art and way of life of the late Iron Age across much of Europe.

Today’s cantonsNeuchâtel

Sources1 16 17 24 26GlossaryLa Tène

The Helvetii set out

58 BCE

The Helvetii, a Celtic people of the Plateau, left with their families to settle in western Gaul. Julius Caesar blocked their way at Geneva, defeated them near Bibracte in Burgundy and sent the survivors home. Almost everything we know comes from Caesar’s own account, written to justify his war. Fifty years earlier, the Helvetian Tigurini under Divico had defeated a Roman army in southern Gaul.

Today’s cantonsGeneva

Later in the lessonsAventicum

Sources1 25 26GlossaryCelts Plateau (Mittelland)

Deep dive

Background and institutions

Archaeology shows the Helvetii as a society of fortified towns, farms and craft workshops on the Plateau, with coins and long-distance trade (Kaenel 2012). Caesar claims that lists written in Greek letters counted 368,000 people setting out, of whom 263,000 were Helvetii.

Critical reading

Caesar wrote his account to justify his campaigns to the Roman public, so his numbers and motives are suspect, and most historians consider the figures inflated. The emigration may have been smaller and more gradual; why the Helvetii left is still debated.

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
25Caesar, Gaius Iulius (c. 58–50 BCE). De bello Gallico, book I. Primary source
26Kaenel, Gilbert (2012). L’an -58. Les Helvètes. Archéologie d’un peuple celte. Scholarly book

Lepontic writing

c. 6th – 1st century BCE

People of the southern Alpine valleys wrote their Celtic language, Lepontic, in an alphabet adapted from the Etruscan one. Large cemeteries such as Giubiasco near Bellinzona preserve their weapons and jewellery, and some of their inscriptions.

Today’s cantonsTicino

Sources1 17GlossaryCelts

The Raetians

until 15 BCE

Roman writers called the peoples of the eastern Alps Raeti. They wrote in alphabets of their own; their language was not Celtic, seems to have been related to Etruscan and is only partly understood.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden

Later in the lessonsRome takes the Alps Chur and Raetia

Sources1 30GlossaryCelts

Rome takes the Alps

15 BCE

In a single summer campaign, Augustus’ stepsons Drusus and Tiberius conquered the peoples of the Alps. Raetia became a province; the Plateau belonged to Roman Gaul and, from the late 1st century, to the province of Upper Germany.

Augusta Raurica

44 BCE – 3rd century

Founded on paper in 44 BCE by Lucius Munatius Plancus, one of Caesar’s generals; the town itself grew from about 15 BCE, with a theatre, temples, baths and workshops. The silver treasure found at Kaiseraugst in 1961–62 was buried around 350.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Landschaft Aargau

Later in the lessonsThe Rhine frontier

Sources1 17 28GlossaryBCE and CE

Vindonissa

c. 15 – 101 CE

The only legionary camp in today’s Switzerland, for some 6,000 soldiers, where the Aare, Reuss and Limmat meet. It guarded the Rhine frontier until 101 CE; its rubbish heap preserved letters, shoes and food remains.

Today’s cantonsAargau

Sources1 17

Aventicum

1st – 3rd century

The capital of the Helvetii under Rome, raised to a colony by Emperor Vespasian around 71 CE, with a theatre, an amphitheatre and walls about 5.5 kilometres long. A golden bust of Emperor Marcus Aurelius was found here in 1939.

Today’s cantonsVaud

Forum Claudii Vallensium

1st century CE

Emperor Claudius made Octodurus, today’s Martigny, the market town of the Valais and had a road built over the Great St Bernard pass, where a temple to the god Poeninus stood. In the valley lived the Nantuates, Veragri, Seduni and Uberi.

Today’s cantonsValais

Later in the lessonsAgaunum and the first bishops Raiders on the passes

Sources1 17

The Rhine frontier

c. 260 – 401

After Alemannic raids around 260, Rome pulled its frontier back to the Rhine and built forts and watchtowers along it, such as Castrum Rauracense at Kaiseraugst. In 401 the field army was withdrawn to defend Italy.

Today’s cantonsAargau

Agaunum and the first bishops

381 – c. 450

The first bishop known by name in today’s Switzerland, Theodorus of Octodurus, attended a church council in Aquileia in 381. Around 430–450, Bishop Eucherius of Lyon wrote down the story of Maurice and the Theban Legion, Christian soldiers from Egypt said to have been killed at Agaunum, today’s Saint-Maurice.

Today’s cantonsValais

Burgundians, Alemanni and the monasteries

As Roman rule ended, new groups settled: Burgundians in the west, Alemanni in the north and east, Lombards in the south. Under Frankish kings, monasteries became centres of farming, writing and power. By 1000 the border between Germanic and Romance speech had largely taken shape.

13 entries

The Burgundians in Sapaudia

443 – 534

In 443 the Roman general Aetius settled the Burgundians in “Sapaudia”, around Lake Geneva. Their kings ruled from Geneva and Lyon and adopted Latin, from which the Franco-Provençal dialects of the region grew.

Today’s cantonsGeneva Vaud

Later in the lessonsThe language border Frankish rule

Sources1 2 5 17 32GlossaryFranco-Provençal

Alemannic settlers

5th – 7th century

Alemannic farmers settled the northern and eastern Plateau. Their Germanic dialects became today’s Swiss German, and many place names ending in -ingen or -ikon go back to their farmsteads.

The language border

from the 6th century

Where Alemannic and Romance speakers met, a language border formed. It has moved little since the late Middle Ages and still runs through the cantons of Bern, Fribourg and Valais.

Today’s cantonsFribourg Bern Valais

Sources1 38GlossarySwiss German Röstigraben

Abbey of Saint-Maurice

515

King Sigismund of Burgundy founded a monastery at the graves of the Theban martyrs in 515. Monks and canons have prayed there ever since, which makes it one of the oldest continuously active religious houses in the West.

Today’s cantonsValais

Frankish rule

534 – 9th century

The Franks conquered the Burgundian kingdom in 534 and took over Alemannia and Raetia in 536–537. For three centuries almost all of today’s Switzerland belonged to the Frankish kingdoms.

The Lombards

568 – 774

From 568 the Lombards ruled northern Italy, including today’s Ticino; the fortified hill of Bellinzona guarded the routes to the Alpine passes. In 774 Charlemagne conquered their kingdom.

Today’s cantonsTicino

Sources1

Chur and Raetia

451 – 9th century

A bishop of Chur is recorded in 451. Later, one local family, the Victorids, held both the bishop’s and the governor’s office for generations. Latin speech survived in the valleys of Raetia and became Romansh.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden

St. Gallen

612 – 9th century

The Irish monk Gallus settled here in 612; the abbey was founded in 719. Its library holds the Plan of St Gall, drawn on the island of Reichenau around 820–830, the oldest surviving architectural plan of the Middle Ages. UNESCO World Heritage since 1983.

Today’s cantonsSt. Gallen

Later in the lessonsWiborada

In Africa, layer by layerTwo places of learning ↗

Sources1 34 35GlossaryAbbey

Müstair

c. 775

A monastery founded around 775 in the Val Müstair; tradition names Charlemagne as its founder. Its church holds the largest surviving cycle of Carolingian wall paintings, from about 800. UNESCO World Heritage since 1983.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden

Sources1 33 36GlossaryAbbey

Fraumünster, Zürich

853

King Louis the German gave a convent in Zürich to his daughter Hildegard in 853. For centuries its abbesses held important rights over the town, such as minting coins.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Sources1GlossaryAbbey

Wiborada

926

A recluse walled into a cell at St. Gallen, Wiborada was killed when Hungarian horsemen raided the town in 926. In 1047 she became the first woman to be canonised by a pope.

Today’s cantonsSt. Gallen

The kingdom of Burgundy

888 – 1032

Rudolf I was crowned king at Saint-Maurice in 888. His kingdom of Upper Burgundy covered western Switzerland; Queen Bertha, remembered in legend as the spinning queen, and her daughter Empress Adelaide are linked with the founding of the priory of Payerne. When the last king died in 1032, Burgundy passed to the Holy Roman Empire.

Today’s cantonsVaud

Raiders on the passes

c. 920 – 973

From a base in Provence, raiders whom chroniclers called Saracens controlled Alpine passes for decades. In 972 they captured Abbot Majolus of Cluny near Orsières, on the Great St Bernard route; he was released for a large ransom.

Today’s cantonsValais

Lords, towns and passes

Under the Holy Roman Empire, counts, bishops and abbeys ruled the land. Noble houses such as the Zähringen, Kyburg, Habsburg and Savoy founded towns and castles, while new routes over the Alps made the valleys around Lake Lucerne important.

10 entries

Habsburg Castle

c. 1020 – 1030

A count named Radbot built this castle above the Aare. The family took its name from it and, from the late 13th century, rose to rule Austria and later much of Europe. Its claims in the region are the background to the first alliances of the valleys.

Today’s cantonsAargau

Later in the lessonsCharters for Uri and Schwyz Lausanne cathedral Morgarten The conquest of the Aargau

Sources1 2 39

Towns of the Zähringen

1157 – 1218

The dukes of Zähringen founded towns to secure their lands: Fribourg in 1157 and Bern in 1191; Thun, Burgdorf and Murten were also built up by them. When the family died out in 1218, Bern and Zürich came directly under the Empire.

Today’s cantonsBern Fribourg

Sources1 40GlossaryImperial immediacy

The ceiling of Zillis

c. 1110 – 1114

The painted wooden ceiling of St. Martin’s church: 153 panels with the life of Christ, framed by sea creatures and monsters. It is one of the oldest surviving figurative painted ceilings in Europe.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden

Sources1

The Gotthard opens

c. 1200 – 1230

Bridges through the Schöllenen gorge, among them the first “Devil’s Bridge”, made the Gotthard the shortest route between the Rhine and Milan. Traffic and tolls brought money and attention to Uri.

Today’s cantonsUri

Later in the lessonsCharters for Uri and Schwyz The Gotthard tunnel

Sources1 42

Charters for Uri and Schwyz

1231 and 1240

King Henry (VII) placed Uri directly under the Empire in 1231; Emperor Frederick II gave Schwyz a similar charter in 1240. These valley communities answered to the emperor, not to a count such as the Habsburgs, at least on paper.

Today’s cantonsUri Schwyz

Later in the lessonsThe Federal Charter

Sources1 42GlossaryImperial immediacy

The Walser

from the late 12th century

German-speaking families from the upper Valais settled high valleys from Piedmont to Vorarlberg, among them Davos, the Rheinwald and Bosco Gurin, the only German-speaking village in Ticino. Lords gave them land and freedoms in return for clearing and holding it.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden Valais Ticino

Later in the lessonsThe Three Leagues

Sources1 6 41GlossaryWalser

Chillon and Savoy

13th century – 1536

Peter II of Savoy extended his house’s rule over Vaud in the 13th century and made the island castle of Chillon a residence. Savoy held the region until Bern conquered it in 1536.

Today’s cantonsVaud

Later in the lessonsThe murders of 1348–1349 Bern turns Reformed

Sources1 5

Lausanne cathedral

1275

Pope Gregory X consecrated the cathedral in 1275, with King Rudolf of Habsburg present. The bishops of Lausanne, Geneva, Sion, Basel, Chur and Constance shaped politics in the region as much as faith.

Today’s cantonsVaud

A bridge for Basel

c. 1225

Bishop Henry of Thun had a bridge built over the Rhine around 1225, one of the few crossings of the river at the time. Basel grew into a trading city on the route between the North Sea and the Alpine passes.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt

Later in the lessonsA council and a university

Sources1

Jewish communities in the towns

from the 13th century

Jewish families lived in Basel, Zürich, Bern and other towns from the 13th century, as merchants, money-lenders and physicians, under the protection, and taxation, of bishops, kings and town councils.

Today’s cantonsZürich Basel-Stadt Bern

Later in the lessonsThe murders of 1348–1349 Equal rights for Jews

Sources1 100

Carried forward

In 1273 Rudolf of Habsburg was elected king. The valley communities on the Gotthard route feared for their rights and made alliances with one another.

Next lesson →

Lesson 051291 – 1515

The Confederation forms

In 1291 three valley communities on the Gotthard route renewed an alliance. Over two centuries, wars against the Habsburgs and Burgundy, purchases and conquests turned a web of pacts into the Thirteen Places, with allies and subject lands. It was not yet a state: each canton kept its own government, and the Diet of their envoys decided only what all agreed. On the map, today’s cantons fill once their territory had joined.

14 entries

The Federal Charter

early August 1291

Uri, Schwyz and Nidwalden renewed an older alliance: mutual help against attackers and rules for settling disputes among themselves. Many such pacts existed. This one, kept in Schwyz, became the founding document only in the 19th century; 1 August has been celebrated since 1891 and has been a public holiday since 1994.

Today’s cantonsUri Schwyz Nidwalden Obwalden

Background and institutions

The charter is a Latin parchment dated only “at the beginning of August 1291”. It names the communities of Uri, Schwyz and Nidwalden, promises mutual help and sets rules against feuds and against judges who bought their office or came from outside. Until the late 19th century the founding of the Confederation was usually dated to 1307, following the chronicler Aegidius Tschudi.

Critical reading

The federal government chose 1291 for a 600th anniversary in 1891, at a time of tension between Catholics and liberals, to give the young federal state a shared founding moment (Kreis 2004). Research since Sablonier (2008) describes the years around 1300 as a time of shifting local power, in which valley elites worked with the Habsburgs as often as against them.

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
2Kreis, Georg (ed.) (2014). Die Geschichte der Schweiz. Scholarly book
3Church, Clive H. & Head, Randolph C. (2013). A Concise History of Switzerland. Scholarly book
4Maissen, Thomas (2010). Geschichte der Schweiz. Scholarly book
10Zimmer, Oliver (2003). A Contested Nation: History, Memory and Nationalism in Switzerland, 1761–1891. Scholarly book
12Kreis, Georg (2004). Mythos Rütli. Geschichte eines Erinnerungsortes. Scholarly book
16Swiss National Museum (permanent exhibitions). History of Switzerland; Archaeology in Switzerland. Museum, archive or database
42Sablonier, Roger (2008). Gründungszeit ohne Eidgenossen. Politik und Gesellschaft in der Innerschweiz um 1300. Scholarly book
43Bundesbrief (Federal Charter) (1291). Latin charter of Uri, Schwyz and Nidwalden. Primary source

Tell and the Rütli

first written c. 1470

The White Book of Sarnen, written around 1470, first tells of the bailiff Gessler, the crossbowman William Tell and an oath on the Rütli meadow. No source from around 1300 confirms them; Friedrich Schiller’s play of 1804 made Tell famous worldwide.

Today’s cantonsUri

Morgarten

15 November 1315

Men of Schwyz ambushed a Habsburg army under Duke Leopold by Lake Ägeri. A few weeks later, at Brunnen, the three valleys renewed their alliance, now written in German.

Today’s cantonsSchwyz Zug

Eight places

1332 – 1353

Lucerne joined in 1332, Zürich in 1351, Glarus and Zug in 1352, Bern in 1353. The “eight places” were not a state but a network of separate treaties, each with its own terms.

Today’s cantonsLucerne Zürich Glarus Zug Bern

The murders of 1348–1349

1348 – 1349

As the plague spread, Jews were accused of poisoning wells; “confessions” were extracted under torture at Chillon in 1348. In Basel, Zürich, Bern and other towns, Jewish communities were murdered or driven out.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt Zürich Bern

Later in the lessonsEqual rights for Jews

Sources1 51

Sempach and Näfels

1386 and 1388

Lucerne and its allies defeated Duke Leopold III of Habsburg at Sempach on 9 July 1386; he died in the battle. Glarus won at Näfels two years later. The hero Winkelried appears only in accounts written long afterwards.

Today’s cantonsLucerne Glarus

The conquest of the Aargau

1415

When King Sigismund outlawed Duke Frederick of Austria, Bern and the other Confederates seized the Aargau. Parts of it, such as Baden, became common lordships, ruled jointly by several cantons through governors: the start of the Confederates’ own subject lands.

Today’s cantonsAargau

The Three Leagues

1367 – 1512

In the Rhaetian Alps, communities formed the League of God’s House (1367), the Grey League (1395) and the League of the Ten Jurisdictions (1436). Bound together from the 15th century, they allied with the Confederates in 1497–98 and ruled the Valtellina from 1512.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden

A council and a university

1431 – 1460

A general council of the Church met in Basel from 1431 to 1449. One of its secretaries, Enea Silvio Piccolomini, later Pope Pius II, founded the University of Basel in 1460, the oldest in Switzerland.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt

The Burgundian Wars

1474 – 1477

Allied with France and the cities of the Upper Rhine, the Confederates defeated Duke Charles the Bold at Grandson and Murten in 1476; he was killed at Nancy in 1477. His captured tents, tapestries and treasure are still shown in Swiss museums.

Today’s cantonsFribourg Vaud

Later in the lessonsThe Stans agreement

Sources1 3 16 27 48GlossaryConfederates (Eidgenossen)

The Stans agreement

22 December 1481

Town and country cantons nearly went to war over the spoils and over admitting new members. The hermit Niklaus von Flüe helped mediate the Stans agreement, and Fribourg and Solothurn were admitted the same day.

Today’s cantonsNidwalden Fribourg Solothurn

The Swabian War

1499

After battles along the Rhine, the last at Dornach, the Peace of Basel ended the war with King Maximilian. The Confederates stayed in the Empire in name but no longer took part in its institutions.

Today’s cantonsSolothurn

Later in the lessonsLeaving the Empire

Sources1 46 48GlossaryConfederates (Eidgenossen)

Thirteen places

1501 – 1513

Basel and Schaffhausen joined in 1501, Appenzell in 1513: the Thirteen Places. Their number did not change until 1798.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt Basel-Landschaft Schaffhausen Appenzell Ausserrhoden Appenzell Innerrhoden

Sources1 46 47GlossaryPlace (Ort)

Mercenaries and Marignano

1506 – 1515

Kings and popes across Europe hired Swiss soldiers; the Pope’s Swiss Guard dates from 1506. At Marignano near Milan, in September 1515, France defeated the Confederates. They stopped expanding, but mercenary service went on for three centuries.

Later in the lessonsThe Swiss Guards in Paris

Sources1 3 7 49GlossaryConfederates (Eidgenossen)Foreign service

Carried forward

After Marignano the Confederates stopped conquering. The next great conflict came from within: over faith.

Next lesson →

Lesson 061515 – 1798

Faith, patricians and subjects

The Reformation split the Confederation into Reformed and Catholic cantons, which fought four wars over faith in two centuries; yet the alliance held. Towns were ruled by small circles of patrician families, the countryside by the towns, the subject lands by governors. Swiss soldiers served foreign kings; merchants and bankers traded across Europe and the Atlantic.

15 entries

Zwingli’s Zürich

1519 – 1531

From 1519 Huldrych Zwingli preached at the Grossmünster. After public disputations in 1523, Zürich abolished the Mass in 1525 and closed its monasteries. Zwingli was killed in 1531 at Kappel, in battle against the Catholic cantons.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Later in the lessonsThe Anabaptists Bern turns Reformed The Catholic answer

Sources1 2 3 52GlossaryAbbey

The Anabaptists

1525 – 1527

In January 1525, a group around Conrad Grebel and Felix Manz baptised adults in Zürich. Persecuted by Reformed and Catholic authorities alike, Manz was drowned in the Limmat in 1527. The Schleitheim articles of the same year became a founding text for Mennonites and Amish worldwide.

Today’s cantonsZürich Schaffhausen

Bern turns Reformed

1528 – 1536

Bern adopted the Reformation in 1528, Basel in 1529. In 1536 Bern conquered Vaud from Savoy and imposed the new faith there; Vaud remained a Bernese subject land until 1798.

Today’s cantonsBern Basel-Stadt Vaud

Later in the lessonsVaud breaks free

Sources1 5 52GlossarySubject lands Reformation

Calvin’s Geneva

1536 – 1564

Jean Calvin made Geneva a centre of the Reformed faith; its Academy, founded in 1559, trained pastors for France, Scotland and the Netherlands. Refugees for their faith were welcomed, dissent was not: the theologian Michael Servetus was burned in 1553.

Today’s cantonsGeneva

Later in the lessonsThe Escalade Refugees for their faith

Sources1 3 5 52 53GlossaryReformation

Printed in Basel

1516 – 1543

Basel’s presses printed Erasmus’ Greek New Testament in 1516 and Andreas Vesalius’ great atlas of human anatomy in 1543. Humanists, reformers and refugees made the city a hub of the European book trade.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt

The Catholic answer

1574 – 1586

The Catholic cantons answered with Jesuit colleges in Lucerne (1574) and Fribourg (1580) and, in 1586, the Golden League among themselves. The Confederation now consisted of two confessional blocs.

Today’s cantonsLucerne Fribourg

The Escalade

11 – 12 December 1602

Troops of the Duke of Savoy tried to take Geneva by night with ladders and were driven back. The city still celebrates the Escalade every December.

Today’s cantonsGeneva

Leaving the Empire

1648

At the peace talks that ended the Thirty Years’ War, Basel’s mayor Johann Rudolf Wettstein obtained the Confederation’s exemption from the Empire’s courts. Europe now treated the Confederation as a sovereign state.

The Peasants’ War

1653

Farmers in Lucerne, Bern, Solothurn and Basel rose against taxes and the rule of the town patricians and swore a league at Huttwil. The towns crushed the revolt; its leaders, among them Niklaus Leuenberger, were executed.

Today’s cantonsBern Lucerne Solothurn Basel-Landschaft

Sources1 2 58GlossaryPatriciate

The Villmergen wars

1656 and 1712

Twice, Catholic and Reformed cantons fought near Villmergen. The Catholics won in 1656; the Reformed won in 1712, and the peace that followed gave both faiths equal rights in the common lordships.

Today’s cantonsAargau

Later in the lessonsThe Sonderbund War

Sources1 3 52GlossaryCommon lordship Reformation

Refugees for their faith

16th – 18th century

Protestants fleeing France and Italy came in waves, the largest after France outlawed their faith in 1685. Tens of thousands passed through; many stayed and brought skills and capital to silk, printed cotton, banking and watchmaking, later centred on La Chaux-de-Fonds and Le Locle.

Today’s cantonsNeuchâtel Geneva Vaud

Swiss money in the Atlantic economy

c. 1719 – 1830

Banks, trading houses and investors from Basel, Bern, Neuchâtel, Geneva and Zürich, the city of Bern among them, held shares in companies of the transatlantic slave trade and in plantations; Swiss merchants financed or fitted out slave ships. This history is told in Africa, layer by layer.

In Africa, layer by layerSwiss money in the slave trade ↗

Sources1 13 14 60 61

Anna Göldi

1782

Accused of harming her employer’s daughter by witchcraft, the maid Anna Göldi was tortured and beheaded in Glarus in June 1782, one of the last executions for witchcraft in Europe. The cantonal parliament rehabilitated her in 2008.

Today’s cantonsGlarus

Sources1 59

Enlightenment and the Alps

1732 – 1790s

Albrecht von Haller’s poem “The Alps” (1732) made the mountains a symbol of virtue; Geneva-born Jean-Jacques Rousseau questioned the foundations of society. From the 1760s the Helvetic Society brought together reformers from all cantons and both faiths at Schinznach.

Today’s cantonsAargau Geneva Bern

Sources1 10 11 62 63 64

The Swiss Guards in Paris

10 August 1792

Hundreds of Swiss guards died defending the Tuileries palace when Paris revolutionaries stormed it. The Lion Monument in Lucerne, carved into the rock in 1821, commemorates them and shows how proud the old elites were of foreign service.

Today’s cantonsLucerne

Revolution and the federal state

In 1798 the old order collapsed within weeks. Under French influence, Switzerland was briefly a single republic, then a league of 19 and, from 1815, 22 cantons. Liberals and conservatives, Reformed and Catholic cantons fought over how much unity the country needed, until a short civil war in 1847 decided it.

13 entries

Vaud breaks free

24 January 1798

With French support, Vaud declared itself free of Bern’s rule. Within weeks the old Confederation collapsed under the French invasion; Bern fell on 5 March 1798.

Today’s cantonsVaud

The Helvetic Republic

1798 – 1803

Proclaimed in Aarau on 12 April 1798: one state, equal citizens, no more subject lands, freedom of religion and of the press. It depended on France, was torn between centralists and federalists, and its territory became a battlefield of foreign armies in 1799.

Today’s cantonsAargau

Later in the lessonsNidwalden, September 1798 The Act of Mediation

Sources1 2 3 4 65 66 67GlossarySubject lands Helvetic Republic

Nidwalden, September 1798

9 September 1798

Nidwalden refused the oath to the new constitution. French troops crushed the resistance; hundreds of people were killed and Stans burned. Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi took in orphaned children there the following winter.

Today’s cantonsNidwalden

The Act of Mediation

19 February 1803

Napoleon dictated a new order: a league of 19 cantons, six of them new: St. Gallen, Graubünden, Aargau, Thurgau, Ticino and Vaud. Former subject lands became equal members.

Vienna, 22 cantons and neutrality

1815

After Napoleon’s fall, the great powers added Valais, Neuchâtel and Geneva, gave the former prince-bishopric of Basel, the Jura, to Bern, and recognised Switzerland’s perpetual neutrality on 20 November 1815.

Background and institutions

Neutrality grew out of practice: after Marignano the Confederates avoided taking sides in the wars of the great powers, while their soldiers served foreign kings. In 1815 the powers recognised Switzerland’s perpetual neutrality because it suited the balance of power in Europe; the Hague Conventions of 1907 later defined the rights and duties of neutral states.

Critical reading

Neutrality was never only a principle. It allowed trade with all sides, including Nazi Germany, and was long used to argue against joining the United Nations, which Switzerland did only in 2002 (Holenstein 2014). The idea that neutrality is far older than 1815 is itself part of the national story.

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
2Kreis, Georg (ed.) (2014). Die Geschichte der Schweiz. Scholarly book
4Maissen, Thomas (2010). Geschichte der Schweiz. Scholarly book
7Holenstein, André (2014). Mitten in Europa. Verflechtung und Abgrenzung in der Schweizer Geschichte. Scholarly book
67Kölz, Alfred (1992). Neuere schweizerische Verfassungsgeschichte. Ihre Grundlinien vom Ende der Alten Eidgenossenschaft bis 1848. Scholarly book

The Basel Mission

from 1815

Founded in Basel in 1815 to train missionaries, it worked on the Gold Coast, today’s Ghana, from 1828, and later in India, China and Cameroon. Its history in Africa, with a critical reading, is part of Africa, layer by layer.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt

In Africa, layer by layerThe Basel Mission ↗

Sources1 13 14 72

The year without a summer

1816 – 1817

After the eruption of Tambora in Indonesia, 1816 brought snow in summer and failed harvests across Europe. In eastern Switzerland thousands died in the famine of 1816–1817, the last great hunger crisis in the country.

Later in the lessonsLeaving and arriving

Sources1 70

The Linth canal

1807 – 1816

Hans Conrad Escher led the draining of the flooded, malaria-ridden Linth plain between Lake Walen and Lake Zürich. It was financed by shares sold across the country, an early national project.

Today’s cantonsGlarus St. Gallen Schwyz

Sources1 71

Uster and the liberal cantons

1830 – 1831

On 22 November 1830, some 10,000 people gathered at Uster to demand a liberal constitution for Zürich. Within a year, many cantons had new constitutions based on popular sovereignty and freedom of the press.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Later in the lessonsBasel divides

Sources1 66 67GlossaryRegeneration

Basel divides

1833

After armed clashes between the town and the countryside, the Diet divided Basel into two half-cantons, Basel-Stadt and Basel-Landschaft, with Liestal as its capital.

Today’s cantonsBasel-Stadt Basel-Landschaft

The first Swiss railway

9 August 1847

The first railway line entirely within Switzerland ran from Zürich to Baden. It was nicknamed the “Spanish bun railway”, after the pastries said to have been carried to Zürich on it.

Today’s cantonsZürich Aargau

Later in the lessonsFranc, railways and banks

Sources1 71 73

The Sonderbund War

3 – 29 November 1847

Seven Catholic cantons had formed a separate alliance, the Sonderbund. The federal army under General Guillaume-Henri Dufour defeated it in less than four weeks, with orders to spare civilians; 93 soldiers died and about 500 were wounded.

Today’s cantonsLucerne Uri Schwyz Obwalden Nidwalden Zug Fribourg Valais

Later in the lessonsThe federal state

Sources1 2 3 68 69GlossarySonderbund

The federal state

12 September 1848

Switzerland became a federal state: a parliament with two chambers, a seven-member Federal Council, federal customs and coinage, freedom of settlement for Christian Swiss citizens and the vote for men only. In November Bern was chosen as the federal city.

Today’s cantonsBern

Industry, democracy and two world wars

Railways, factories and banks made Switzerland one of Europe’s richest countries; the tunnels through the Alps were built largely by Italian workers. Direct democracy grew step by step, but only for men. Neutrality kept the country out of both world wars, at a price that was examined only decades later.

15 entries

Franc, railways and banks

1850 – 1882

A single Swiss franc replaced the cantonal currencies in 1850. In Zürich, Alfred Escher drove the private railways, the Federal Polytechnic (ETH, opened in 1855), the bank Credit Suisse (1856) and the Gotthard line.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Later in the lessonsThe Gotthard tunnel The end of Credit Suisse

Sources1 2 16 73

The Red Cross

1863 – 1864

After witnessing the battlefield of Solferino, the Geneva businessman Henry Dunant called for neutral help for the wounded. The committee founded in Geneva in 1863 became the International Committee of the Red Cross; the first Geneva Convention followed in 1864.

Today’s cantonsGeneva

Later in the lessonsThe League of Nations in Geneva

In Africa, layer by layerA Geneva company in Algeria ↗

Sources1 5 74GlossaryNeutrality

Equal rights for Jews

1866 and 1874

For almost a century, Jews in the Confederation were allowed to live only in the Aargau villages of Endingen and Lengnau. A vote in 1866 gave them freedom of settlement; the revised constitution of 1874 granted freedom of religion.

Today’s cantonsAargau

Later in the lessonsThe people decide Refugees turned away

Sources1 6 15 75 100

The people decide

1874 – 1893

The revised constitution of 1874 introduced the optional referendum on federal laws; from 1891 citizens could propose amendments by popular initiative. The first initiative accepted, in 1893, banned kosher slaughter, an antisemitic measure.

The Gotthard tunnel

1872 – 1882

The 15-kilometre rail tunnel was dug by thousands of workers, most of them from Italy; at least 199 died. When they struck in 1875 over pay and conditions, a militia shot four of them. Anti-Italian riots followed in Bern in 1893 and in Zürich in 1896.

Today’s cantonsUri Ticino

Later in the lessonsWorkers from the south

Sources1 6 73 88GlossaryMilitia

Women at university

from 1867

The University of Zürich was among the first in Europe to admit women. In 1867 Nadezhda Suslova from Russia became the first woman to earn a doctorate there; Swiss women would wait more than a century for the vote.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Later in the lessonsVotes for women

Sources1 87

Leaving and arriving

19th century

Poverty drove hundreds of thousands to emigrate, to the Americas, Russia and elsewhere; in 1845 families from Glarus founded New Glarus in Wisconsin. Around 1890 the balance turned and Switzerland became a country of immigration.

Dada in Zürich

1916

In neutral Zürich, Hugo Ball and Emmy Hennings opened the Cabaret Voltaire in February 1916. With artists who had fled the war, among them Tristan Tzara and Hans Arp, it became the birthplace of Dada.

Today’s cantonsZürich

In Africa, layer by layerDada and African art ↗

Sources1 85GlossaryNeutrality

The general strike

12 – 14 November 1918

After years of wartime hunger and inflation, about 250,000 workers went on strike, demanding the vote for women, a 48-hour week and old-age pensions. The army was sent in; in Grenchen soldiers shot three young watchmakers.

Today’s cantonsSolothurn

Later in the lessonsOld-age pensions Votes for women

Sources1 2 8 76

The League of Nations in Geneva

1920

Voters agreed in May 1920 to join the League of Nations, and Geneva became its seat. In 1936 Ethiopia’s emperor Haile Selassie appealed there for help against Italy’s invasion.

Today’s cantonsGeneva

A fourth national language

20 February 1938

With over 90 percent yes, voters made Romansh the fourth national language, a statement of diversity at a time when fascist Italy claimed Romansh as an Italian dialect.

Today’s cantonsGraubünden

“Children of the Road”

1926 – 1973

The foundation Pro Juventute, backed by the authorities, took about 600 Yenish children from their families to make them settle. The Confederation apologised in 1986.

Today’s cantonsZürich

Later in the lessonsContract children and forced placements

Sources1 81 82 101GlossaryYenish Children of the Road

Contract children and forced placements

until 1981

Until well into the 20th century, hundreds of thousands of children from poor families were placed on farms or in homes, often as unpaid labour. Until 1981, adults could be locked up without trial by “administrative detention”. The Confederation apologised in 2013 and has paid solidarity contributions to victims since 2017.

Background and institutions

Municipal poor-relief authorities placed children of poor, unmarried or divorced parents with farm families, at times to whoever asked for the lowest boarding fee. Adults labelled “work-shy” or “dissolute” could be interned in institutions by an administrative decision, without a court.

Critical reading

Testimonies of those affected, collected from the 2000s onwards, broke a long silence (Leuenberger & Seglias 2008). The independent expert commission called the system arbitrary and incompatible with the rule of law (UEK 2019). A federal law of 2017 recognised the injustice and pays each person affected a solidarity contribution of CHF 25,000.

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
83Unabhängige Expertenkommission Administrative Versorgungen (UEK) (2019). Organisierte Willkür. Administrative Versorgungen in der Schweiz 1930–1981. Schlussbericht. Official record
84Leuenberger, Marco & Seglias, Loretta (eds.) (2008). Versorgt und vergessen. Ehemalige Verdingkinder erzählen. Scholarly book

Refugees turned away

1938 – 1945

In 1938 the Federal Council agreed with Germany that Jewish passports be stamped with a “J”. From August 1942, people fleeing “only on racial grounds” were not recognised as refugees. About 24,000 people were turned back at the border; just over 51,000 civilian refugees were taken in. In St. Gallen, police commander Paul Grüninger let hundreds of Jewish refugees in against orders; he was dismissed and rehabilitated only in 1995.

Today’s cantonsSt. Gallen

Background and institutions

Refugee policy was made by the Federal Council and the police division of the justice department under Heinrich Rothmund. In August 1942, when the deportations in occupied Europe were known in Bern, the border was closed to refugees “only on racial grounds”; Jews were recognised as endangered refugees only from July 1944. The Bergier Commission counted about 24,000 rejections and just over 51,000 civilian refugees admitted.

Critical reading

For decades the official story was of a small country that had done what it could. The Ludwig report of 1957 first named the failures; the Bergier Commission concluded that antisemitism shaped the policy and that the authorities knew a rejection could mean death (ICE 2002). Individuals such as Paul Grüninger helped against the rules and were punished for it.

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
4Maissen, Thomas (2010). Geschichte der Schweiz. Scholarly book
8Tanner, Jakob (2015). Geschichte der Schweiz im 20. Jahrhundert. Scholarly book
75Picard, Jacques (1994). Die Schweiz und die Juden 1933–1945. Schweizerischer Antisemitismus, jüdische Abwehr und internationale Migrations- und Flüchtlingspolitik. Scholarly book
77Independent Commission of Experts Switzerland – Second World War (ICE/UEK) (2002). Switzerland, National Socialism and the Second World War. Final Report. Official record
78Ludwig, Carl (1957). Die Flüchtlingspolitik der Schweiz seit 1933 bis zur Gegenwart. Bericht an den Bundesrat. Official record
79Keller, Stefan (1993). Grüningers Fall. Geschichten von Flucht und Hilfe. Scholarly book
80Wylie, Neville (2003). Britain, Switzerland, and the Second World War. Scholarly book

War, réduit and business

1939 – 1945

General Henri Guisan gathered his officers on the Rütli in July 1940 and withdrew the army into an Alpine “réduit”. At the same time, Swiss industry and banks traded with both sides, and the national bank bought gold from Nazi Germany, including looted gold.

Today’s cantonsUri

Later in the lessonsFacing the war years

Sources1 2 3 8 11 12 77 80GlossaryRéduit

Carried forward

In 1945 Switzerland was intact while its neighbours lay in ruins. The boom that followed needed workers from abroad, and women still had no vote.

Next lesson →

Lesson 091945 – today

Switzerland since 1945

After 1945 Switzerland grew rich and more diverse. Women won the vote only in 1971, the Jura became a canton in 1979, and the country debated, vote by vote, its ties with Europe, its migrants and its past. Today about nine million people live here.

17 entries

Old-age pensions

6 July 1947

Voters approved old-age and survivors’ insurance (AHV/AVS), a demand of the 1918 strike, by a large majority; it has paid pensions since 1948.

Workers from the south

1948 – 2002

An agreement with Italy in 1948 brought hundreds of thousands of workers, later also from Spain, Portugal, Yugoslavia and Turkey. Many held seasonal permits that did not allow their families to join them; some children lived in hiding. The seasonal status was abolished in 2002.

Today’s cantonsTicino

Mattmark

30 August 1965

An ice avalanche from the Allalin glacier buried the construction site of the Mattmark dam: 88 workers died, 56 of them from Italy.

Today’s cantonsValais

The Schwarzenbach initiative

7 June 1970

An initiative to cap the foreign population at 10 percent in most cantons, which would have forced some 300,000 people to leave, was rejected by 54 percent of voters. Its language of “foreign infiltration” (Überfremdung) shaped politics for decades.

Votes for women

7 February 1971

Men voted 65.7 percent yes to give women the vote at federal level, after a first no in 1959. Among the first women elected to the federal parliament that autumn was Tilo Frey of Neuchâtel. Appenzell Innerrhoden had to be ordered by the Federal Supreme Court in 1990 to let women vote in cantonal matters.

Today’s cantonsBern Appenzell Innerrhoden

Later in the lessonsEqual rights and two strikes

In Africa, layer by layerTilo Frey ↗

Sources1 2 15 87 89 90 99

Deep dive

Background and institutions

Women’s associations demanded the vote from the late 19th century, and the strike of 1918 put it at the top of its list. Because any change to the federal constitution needed a yes from male voters and the cantons, women depended on men; they said no in 1959. Vaud and Neuchâtel introduced women’s suffrage at cantonal level the same year.

Critical reading

Explanations for the late date include direct democracy itself, which required men to vote away their monopoly, and the image of women at home promoted by the “spiritual national defence” of the 1930s to 1950s (Voegeli 1997). Comparative research with the United States looks at how the two movements organised and which openings they used (Banaszak 1996).

Key sources

1Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS) / Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse (DHS) / Dizionario storico della Svizzera (DSS) (2002–2014). 13 vols. and online edition. Reference work
2Kreis, Georg (ed.) (2014). Die Geschichte der Schweiz. Scholarly book
15Swiss Federal Chancellery (since 1848). Popular votes: chronology and results. Official record
87Mesmer, Beatrix (1988). Ausgeklammert – Eingeklammert. Frauen und Frauenorganisationen in der Schweiz des 19. Jahrhunderts. Scholarly book
89Voegeli, Yvonne (1997). Zwischen Hausrat und Rathaus. Auseinandersetzungen um die politische Gleichberechtigung der Frauen in der Schweiz 1945–1971. Scholarly book
90Banaszak, Lee Ann (1996). Why Movements Succeed or Fail: Opportunity, Culture, and the Struggle for Woman Suffrage. Scholarly book
99Gosteli Foundation (archive). Archive on the history of the Swiss women’s movement. Museum, archive or database

The canton of Jura

1974 – 2026

After decades of conflict between Bern and the French-speaking, largely Catholic north of the Bernese Jura, a series of votes created the canton of Jura, which has existed since 1 January 1979; the southern districts stayed with Bern. In 2021 the town of Moutier voted to change canton and joined Jura on 1 January 2026.

Today’s cantonsJura Bern

Sources1 5 9 15 94

Equal rights and two strikes

1981 – 2019

Equal rights for women and men entered the constitution on 14 June 1981. Ten years later to the day, hundreds of thousands of women went on strike because equality had not arrived; they struck again on 14 June 2019.

No to the EEA

6 December 1992

With 50.3 percent and most cantons against, voters rejected the European Economic Area. Switzerland took the path of bilateral agreements with the EU instead, including the free movement of persons from 2002 and Schengen from 2008.

Sources1 2 3 7 8 9 15 94 95GlossaryDouble majority Bilateral agreements

Facing the war years

1996 – 2002

Under pressure over the dormant accounts of Holocaust victims, the government set up an independent commission of historians led by Jean-François Bergier. Its reports on refugee policy, gold and business with Nazi Germany changed how the country sees its war years. Two Swiss banks agreed a settlement of US$1.25 billion in 1998.

Sources1 4 8 77GlossaryDormant accounts

Joining the United Nations

10 September 2002

After a yes in the popular vote of March 2002, Switzerland became the 190th member of the United Nations. Geneva had long hosted its European headquarters.

Today’s cantonsGeneva

The minaret ban

29 November 2009

57.5 percent of voters approved a ban on building new minarets. The vote was criticised internationally and by Muslim organisations in Switzerland.

Sources1 15 94

The responsible business initiative

29 November 2020

50.7 percent of voters said yes to making companies based in Switzerland liable for human-rights and environmental harm abroad, but most cantons said no, so it failed. Cases cited in the campaign included mines in Zambia and the DR Congo.

Later in the lessonsSwitzerland and Africa since 1945

Sources1 13 15 94GlossaryPopular initiative Double majority

Marriage for all

26 September 2021

64.1 percent of voters opened civil marriage to same-sex couples; the law has been in force since 1 July 2022.

Sources1 15

The end of Credit Suisse

19 March 2023

Founded by Alfred Escher in 1856, Credit Suisse was taken over by UBS in an emergency deal arranged with the federal government, the national bank and the financial regulator.

Today’s cantonsZürich

The climate seniors

9 April 2024

The European Court of Human Rights ruled that Switzerland had violated the rights of a group of older women by doing too little against climate change, the court’s first such judgment against a state.

Sources1 97

Nine million

2024

Switzerland passed nine million residents in 2024. At the end of that year, 27.4 percent of them held a foreign passport, and around four in ten people aged 15 and over had a migration background.

Sources1 2 6 92 96

Switzerland and Africa since 1945

1945 – today

Swiss diplomats helped prepare the talks that ended the Algerian war, Swiss business traded with apartheid South Africa, and Switzerland became a centre of the global commodity trade, while Afro-descendant people in Switzerland shaped its politics, culture and science. These ties are the ninth layer of Africa, layer by layer.

In Africa, layer by layerThe Évian talks ↗Switzerland and apartheid ↗Kofi Annan ↗Tilo Frey ↗

Sources1 13 14GlossaryAfro-descendant

Carried forward

The next layers are being written now: in votes, in archives and in the stories of everyone who lives here.

Who lived here →

Who lived here

Peoples and groups who shaped the land, from the first hunters to today. Each card leads back to the lessons.

until c. 40,000 years agoNeanderthalsThe first people known here. They hunted in the Jura and the Alpstein; their remains in Switzerland are rare.In the lessonsCotencher cave Wildkirchli

c. 15,000 – 11,000 years agoIce Age huntersModern humans who followed reindeer and horses after the ice retreated.In the lessonsKesslerloch Champréveyres and Monruz

from c. 5500 BCEFirst farmersThey brought wheat, barley, cattle, sheep and pottery from the south and from the north; later, newcomers from the steppes mixed in.In the lessonsPile dwellings Schnidejoch Petit-Chasseur, Sion Newcomers from the steppe

2nd century BCE – Roman timesHelvetiiCeltic people of the Plateau, organised in several groups, among them the Tigurini. Switzerland’s Latin name, Helvetia, comes from them.In the lessonsThe Helvetii set out Aventicum

1st century BCERauriciCeltic people around the bend of the Rhine at Basel, who set out with the Helvetii in 58 BCE. Augusta Raurica bears their name.In the lessonsAugusta Raurica The Helvetii set out

until 121 BCEAllobrogesCeltic people between the Rhône and the Isère whose northernmost town was Geneva; Rome subdued them in 121 BCE.In the lessonsThe Helvetii set out

c. 6th – 1st century BCELepontiiPeople of the southern Alpine valleys, in today’s Ticino and neighbouring Italy, who wrote their Celtic language.In the lessonsLepontic writing

until 15 BCERaetiansPeoples of the eastern Alps, conquered by Rome in 15 BCE; their name lives on in the Rhaetian Alps and the Rhaetian Railway.In the lessonsThe Raetians Rome takes the Alps Chur and Raetia

until 15 BCEPeoples of the ValaisFour Celtic peoples, the Nantuates, Veragri, Seduni and Uberi. The Seduni gave Sion its name.In the lessonsForum Claudii Vallensium

15 BCE – 401 CERomansSoldiers, officials, traders and settlers from many provinces lived alongside the local population, which adopted Latin.In the lessonsVindonissa Augusta Raurica Aventicum The Rhine frontier

from 443BurgundiansA Germanic people settled around Lake Geneva by Rome. They adopted Latin and, under King Sigismund, Catholic Christianity.In the lessonsThe Burgundians in Sapaudia Abbey of Saint-Maurice Frankish rule

from the 5th centuryAlemanniGermanic farmers on the northern and eastern Plateau; their speech became Swiss German.In the lessonsAlemannic settlers The language border The Rhine frontier

568 – 774LombardsRulers of northern Italy, including today’s Ticino, until Charlemagne’s conquest.In the lessonsThe Lombards

from the late 12th centuryWalserGerman-speaking settlers from the upper Valais who cleared high valleys across the Alps; Walser German is still spoken in some of them.In the lessonsThe Walser

from the 13th centuryJewsJewish life here was repeatedly destroyed by persecution and expulsion, confined to two Aargau villages from the 1770s, and became free and equal only in 1866–1874.In the lessonsJewish communities in the towns The murders of 1348–1349 Equal rights for Jews Refugees turned away

recognised as a national minority since 1998Yenish, Sinti and ManouchesTravelling and settled families, some with their own language, Yenish. Switzerland recognises them as a national minority and, since 2016, by their own names. Between 1926 and 1973 hundreds of Yenish children were taken from their families.In the lessons“Children of the Road”

16th – 18th centuryRefugees for their faithProtestants from France, Italy and elsewhere who fled to Geneva, Basel, Zürich and Bern; many stayed.In the lessonsCalvin’s Geneva Refugees for their faith

from the 1870sItalian workersThey built tunnels, railways, dams and cities, faced riots and restrictive permits, and shaped everyday life far beyond Ticino.In the lessonsThe Gotthard tunnel Workers from the south Mattmark The Schwarzenbach initiative

2024Everyone here todayAbout nine million people. More than a quarter hold a foreign passport, the largest groups from Italy, Germany, Portugal and France, and Afro-descendant people are part of the country’s past and present.In the lessonsNine million Switzerland and Africa since 1945

The 26 cantons

Grouped by when their territory joined the Confederation, with capital, official languages and a line of history. The links lead back to the lessons.

1291–1353 · The eight old places

Uri

Capital Altdorf

1291 · founding cantonGermanFounding canton on the Gotthard route, placed directly under the Empire in 1231.In the lessonsThe Gotthard opens Charters for Uri and Schwyz The Federal Charter Tell and the Rütli The Sonderbund War The Gotthard tunnel War, réduit and business

Schwyz

Capital Schwyz

1291 · founding cantonGermanFounding canton that gave Switzerland its name; the Federal Charter of 1291 is kept here.In the lessonsCharters for Uri and Schwyz The Federal Charter Morgarten The Linth canal The Sonderbund War

Obwalden

Capital Sarnen

1291 · founding canton, as part of UnterwaldenGermanHalf of old Unterwalden and home of the hermit Niklaus von Flüe; the White Book of Sarnen is kept in its archive.In the lessonsThe Federal Charter The Sonderbund War

Nidwalden

Capital Stans

1291 · founding canton, as part of UnterwaldenGermanHalf of old Unterwalden, named in the Federal Charter of 1291; crushed by French troops in 1798.In the lessonsThe Federal Charter The Stans agreement Nidwalden, September 1798 The Sonderbund War

Lucerne

Capital Lucerne

1332 · joined the ConfederationGermanThe first town to join the valley communities, later the leading Catholic canton.In the lessonsEight places Sempach and Näfels The Catholic answer The Peasants’ War The Swiss Guards in Paris The Sonderbund War

Zürich

Capital Zürich

1351 · joined the ConfederationGermanImperial city that joined in 1351; the Reformation of Zwingli began here. Today the most populous canton.In the lessonsPile dwellings Fraumünster, Zürich Jewish communities in the towns Eight places The murders of 1348–1349 Zwingli’s Zürich The Anabaptists Uster and the liberal cantons The first Swiss railway Franc, railways and banks Women at university Dada in Zürich “Children of the Road”The end of Credit Suisse

Glarus

Capital Glarus

1352 · joined the ConfederationGermanVictor at Näfels in 1388; one of two cantons that still decide by open-air assembly, the Landsgemeinde.In the lessonsEight places Sempach and Näfels Anna Göldi The Linth canal

Zug

Capital Zug

1352 · joined the ConfederationGermanThe smallest of the former full cantons by area, today a hub of international companies and commodity trading.In the lessonsMorgarten Eight places The Sonderbund War

Bern

Capital Bern

1353 · joined the ConfederationGerman · FrenchFounded by the Zähringen in 1191, Bern became the largest city-state north of the Alps and ruled Vaud and much of the Aargau until 1798. Federal city since 1848.In the lessonsSchnidejoch Newcomers from the steppe The Grächwil jar The language border Towns of the Zähringen Jewish communities in the towns Eight places The murders of 1348–1349 Bern turns Reformed The Peasants’ War Enlightenment and the Alps The federal state Votes for women The canton of Jura

1481–1513 · Up to thirteen

Fribourg

Capital Fribourg

1481 · joined the ConfederationFrench · GermanFounded by the Zähringen in 1157 on the language border; admitted in 1481 and officially bilingual.In the lessonsThe language border Towns of the Zähringen The Burgundian Wars The Stans agreement The Catholic answer The Sonderbund War

Solothurn

Capital Solothurn

1481 · joined the ConfederationGermanAdmitted in 1481; from 1530 to 1792 the seat of the French king’s ambassadors to the Confederation.In the lessonsThe Stans agreement The Swabian War The Peasants’ War The general strike

Basel-Stadt

Capital Basel

1501 · joined as Basel; half-canton since 1833GermanBishop’s city with the oldest Swiss university (1460); home of the Basel Mission and of the chemical and pharmaceutical industry.In the lessonsA bridge for Basel Jewish communities in the towns The murders of 1348–1349 A council and a university Thirteen places Bern turns Reformed Printed in Basel The Basel Mission Basel divides

Basel-Landschaft

Capital Liestal

1501 · joined as Basel; half-canton since 1833GermanThe countryside of Basel, separate from the city since 1833 after armed clashes.In the lessonsAugusta Raurica Thirteen places The Peasants’ War Basel divides

Schaffhausen

Capital Schaffhausen

1501 · joined the ConfederationGermanJoined in 1501, almost entirely north of the Rhine. US bombers hit the town by mistake on 1 April 1944, killing 40 people.In the lessonsKesslerloch Thirteen places The Anabaptists

Appenzell Ausserrhoden

Capital Herisau

1513 · joined as Appenzell; half-canton since 1597GermanThe Reformed half of Appenzell since the division of 1597, long a centre of textile work at home.In the lessonsThirteen places

Appenzell Innerrhoden

Capital Appenzell

1513 · joined as Appenzell; half-canton since 1597GermanThe Catholic half of Appenzell since 1597; it still holds its Landsgemeinde. Women gained the cantonal vote only in 1990, by order of the Federal Supreme Court.In the lessonsWildkirchli Thirteen places Votes for women

1803 · Act of Mediation

St. Gallen

Capital St. Gallen

1803 · canton under the Act of MediationGermanCreated in 1803 from the lands of the prince-abbey, the town and former subject territories. Around 1910 St. Gallen embroidery was Switzerland’s largest export.In the lessonsSt. Gallen Wiborada The Linth canal Refugees turned away

Graubünden

Capital Chur

1803 · canton under the Act of MediationGerman · Romansh · ItalianThe former Three Leagues, allied with the Confederates from 1497–98 and a canton since 1803; the only trilingual canton.In the lessonsThe Raetians Chur and Raetia Müstair The ceiling of Zillis The Walser The Three Leagues A fourth national language

Aargau

Capital Aarau

1803 · canton under the Act of MediationGermanHomeland of the Habsburgs, conquered in 1415 and ruled as subject land until 1798; canton since 1803.In the lessonsAugusta Raurica Vindonissa The Rhine frontier Habsburg Castle The conquest of the Aargau The Villmergen wars Enlightenment and the Alps The Helvetic Republic The first Swiss railway Equal rights for Jews

Thurgau

Capital Frauenfeld

1803 · canton under the Act of MediationGermanA common lordship of the Confederates from 1460 to 1798; canton since 1803.

Ticino

Capital Bellinzona

1803 · canton under the Act of MediationItalianConquered step by step by the Confederates between 1403 and 1512 and ruled as subject lands; since 1803 the Italian-speaking canton.In the lessonsLepontic writing The Lombards The Walser The Gotthard tunnel Workers from the south

Vaud

Capital Lausanne

1803 · canton under the Act of MediationFrenchSavoyard, then a Bernese subject land from 1536; it declared itself free in January 1798. Lausanne has been home to the International Olympic Committee since 1915.In the lessonsAventicum The Burgundians in Sapaudia The kingdom of Burgundy Chillon and Savoy Lausanne cathedral The Burgundian Wars Bern turns Reformed Refugees for their faith Vaud breaks free

1815 · Congress of Vienna

Valais

Capital Sion

1815 · joined after the Congress of ViennaFrench · GermanThe bishopric of Sion and the communities of the upper valley, long allied with the Confederates; a canton since 1815.In the lessonsSchnidejoch Petit-Chasseur, Sion Forum Claudii Vallensium Agaunum and the first bishops The language border Abbey of Saint-Maurice Raiders on the passes The Walser The Sonderbund War Mattmark

Neuchâtel

Capital Neuchâtel

1815 · joined after the Congress of ViennaFrenchRuled by the King of Prussia from 1707, it joined as a canton in 1815 while remaining a principality; a republic since 1848, and free of Prussian claims since 1857.In the lessonsCotencher cave Champréveyres and Monruz La Tène Refugees for their faith

Geneva

Capital Geneva

1815 · joined after the Congress of ViennaFrenchCity of Calvin and an ally of Bern and Fribourg from 1526; seat of the Red Cross and of the United Nations in Europe.In the lessonsThe Helvetii set out The Burgundians in Sapaudia Calvin’s Geneva The Escalade Refugees for their faith Enlightenment and the Alps The Red Cross The League of Nations in Geneva Joining the United Nations

1979 · The newest canton

Jura

Capital Delémont

1979 · separated from BernFrenchPart of the prince-bishopric of Basel until the 1790s and given to Bern in 1815; the newest canton since 1979, joined by Moutier in 2026.In the lessonsThe canton of Jura

Sources

Source library102 sourcesThe 102 works behind the lessons: peer-reviewed research, scholarly books, reference works, primary sources, museum and archive records. Every entry cites its sources by number.Glossary54 termsWords from Swiss history in plain language, from pile dwelling to Überfremdung, each linked to the lessons where it appears.

Checked October 2026.