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Huldrych Zwingli or Ulrich Zwingli was a leader of the Reformation in Switzerland, born during a time of emerging Swiss patriotism and increasing criticism of the Swiss mercenary system. He attended the University of Vienna and the University of Basel, a scholarly center of Renaissance humanism. He continued his studies while he served as a pastor in Glarus and later in Einsiedeln, where he was influenced by the writings of Erasmus.
Since 1848 the Swiss Confederation has been a federal republic of relatively autonomous cantons, some of which have a history of confederacy that goes back more than 700 years, putting them among the world's oldest surviving republics.
The canton of Uri is one of the 26 cantons of Switzerland and a founding member of the Swiss Confederation. It is located in Central Switzerland. The canton's territory covers the valley of the Reuss between the St. Gotthard Pass and Lake Lucerne.
The canton of Obwalden, also canton of Obwald is a canton of Switzerland. It is located in the centre of Switzerland. Its capital is Sarnen. The canton contains the geographical centre of Switzerland.
Altdorf is a historic town and municipality in Switzerland. It is the capital of the Swiss canton of Uri.
William Tell is a folk hero of Switzerland. According to the legend, Tell was an expert marksman with the crossbow who assassinated Albrecht Gessler, a tyrannical reeve of the Austrian dukes of the House of Habsburg positioned in Altdorf, in the canton of Uri. Tell's defiance and tyrannicide encouraged the population to open rebellion and a pact against the foreign rulers with neighbouring Schwyz and Unterwalden, marking the foundation of the Swiss Confederacy.
The Old Swiss Confederacy began as a late medieval alliance between the communities of the valleys in the Central Alps, at the time part of the Holy Roman Empire, to facilitate the management of common interests such as free trade and to ensure the peace along the important trade routes through the mountains. The Hohenstaufen emperors had granted these valleys reichsfrei status in the early 13th century. As reichsfrei regions, the cantons of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden were under the direct authority of the emperor without any intermediate liege lords and thus were largely autonomous.
Eidgenossenschaft is a German word specific to the political history of Switzerland. It translates to "oath fellowship" in reference to the "eternal pacts" formed between the Eight Cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy of the late medieval period, most notably in Swiss historiography being the Rütlischwur between the three founding cantons Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden, traditionally dated to 1307. In modern usage, it is the German term used as equivalent with "Confederation" in the official name of Switzerland, Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft, rendered Confédération and Confederazione in French and Italian, respectively. The related adjective, eidgenössisch, officially translated as Swiss federal, is used in the name of organisations, for example the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. The term Eidgenosse refers to the individual members of the Eidgenossenschaft. It is attested as early as 1315, in the Pact of Brunnen, referring to the cantons of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden. The abstract noun Eidgenossenschaft is attested in the 15th century. In modern usage, Eidgenosse is sometimes used for "Swiss citizen".
Melchior Russ was born of an old noble family in Lucerne.
The Rütlischwur is the legendary oath taken at the foundation of the Old Swiss Confederacy by the representatives of the three founding cantons, Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden, traditionally dated to 1307. It is named for the site of the oath-taking, the Rütli, a meadow above Lake Uri near Seelisberg. Recorded in Swiss historiography from the 15th century, the oath is notably featured in the play William Tell by Friedrich Schiller (1804).
The White Book of Sarnen is a collection of medieval manuscripts compiled in the late 15th century by Hans Schriber, state secretary (Landschreiber) in the canton of Obwalden. This volume, 258 pages in length, was given its name because of the white parchment in which it is bound. The White Book of Sarnen contains the earliest surviving reference to the Swiss national hero William Tell.
The Bundeslied or Tellenlied is a patriotic song of the Old Swiss Confederacy. Its original composition dates to the Burgundian Wars period (1470s). The oldest extant manuscript text was written in 1501, the first publication in print dates to 1545. It consists of stanzas of six lines each, with a rhyming scheme of A-A-B-C-C-B. It is one of the oldest existing records of the legend of Swiss national hero William Tell.
The Chronicle of the City of Lucerne is the oldest existing chronological account of the history of the city of Lucerne.
The Chronicle of the Swiss Confederation is the oldest printed chronicle of Switzerland.
Conrad Justinger was probably born in Strasbourg. Justinger, who had learned the trade of a chronicler in his home-town, appears to have moved to the city of Bern in the last quarter of the 14th century. From 1390 until his death, Justinger served the city of Bern as a magistrate and notary public.
The Chronicon Helveticum is one of the oldest accounts of the early history of the Swiss Confederation.
The historiography of Switzerland is the study of the history of Switzerland.
The Affair of the Sausages (1522) was the event that sparked the Reformation in Zürich. Huldrych Zwingli, pastor of Grossmünster in Zurich, Switzerland, spearheaded the event by publicly speaking in favor of eating sausage during the Lenten fast. Zwingli defended this action in a sermon called Von Erkiesen und Freiheit der Speisen, in which he argued, from the basis of Martin Luther's doctrine of sola scriptura, that "Christians are free to fast or not to fast because the Bible does not prohibit the eating of meat during Lent."
The Reformation in Zürich was promoted initially by Huldrych Zwingli, who gained the support of the magistrates of the city of Zürich and the princess abbess Katharina von Zimmern of the Fraumünster Abbey, and the population of the city of Zürich and agriculture-oriented population of the present Canton of Zürich in the early 1520s. It led to significant changes in civil life and state matters in Zürich and spread to several other cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy, and thus initiated the Reformation in Switzerland.
Uri is a Swiss Talschaft and canton in the upper Reuss valley.
References
- Bergier, Jean-François. Wilhelm Tell: Realität und Mythos. München: Paul List Verlag, 1990.