Talk:History of Switzerland

Contents

1 article structure 2 World war description 3 CH Where does it stand for? 4 Valtellina 5 Swiss territorial increase claim is wrong

article structure

Can anyone write a non-linear history of Switzerland (maybe to complement)? If we refer to the Swiss say in 1315 (Morgarten), who were they, who were the others? Oh, and the Habsburgs, weren't they Swiss, too? What I mean is that for a long time 'Switzerland' wasn't as big as it is today and many battles were fought between what is Switzerland and oh, what is Switzerland now.... Kokiri

de:Geschichte_der_Schweiz is much better structured, and much more detailed. I will start to remodel this article after it. The problem is that in prehistoric to early medieval times, "History of Switzerland" amounts to the History of the territory of modern Switzerland. After 1291, the focus is contracted to the founding cantons (since the other territories belong to France and the Holy Roman Empire, and should be included in the histories of these), and slowly expanding again, until in 1815, the modern territory is again reached. This is not really a problem, but it has to be made clear from the article text. It's silly to start with 1291, though. Much can be said about Archaeology, the Helvetians vs. Caesar, the frankian cities in the early middle ages, etc. dab 08:51, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I've tried to jump-start this process by supplying a Template:History of Switzerland and also writing the first article of that proposed series. The template is a bit preliminary, though. See Template talk:History of Switzerland. Lupo 13:42, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

very good. We could reduce this article to essentially a long chronological bullet list, maybe with a summarizing paragraph for each section, and export the present text, as far as it is worth keeping, to the sub-articles. Concerning the article titles:

• "Napoleonic era" is mostly about post-napoleonic times. Can't think of a better title at the moment, though.
• "Democracy" is slightly misleading, since forms of democracy have been present for much longer. We should say "Constitution" or "Federal State".
• I suggest we lump 1914-1938 with WWII.
• "Modern history" is misleading. So is "postwar" (because there was no war, in Switzerland). Simple "After 1945" is probably better.

dab 15:04, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I wouldn't turn the article into a pure chronological list. I like short summary paragraphs better. If you come up with a better term for what I've called tentatively the "Napoleonic era", go ahead and change it. I am quite aware that it would cover many events after Napoleon I was sent to exile. "Federal State" as a shortcut for Switzerland as a liberal democracy sounds good. Lupo 15:33, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

"Napoleonic era" is fine. Federal State is preferable in my view, because of the widely differing uses of liberal. Maybe the subsections in "before 1291" maybe too much for this summary; since there's a main article, we can get away with being very brief. dab 15:37, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Ok, I've changed the template accordingly. Lupo 07:45, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

World war description

I have removed the following from the Switzerland article:

--Spain and Sweden also sold munitions and other industrial products to Nazi Germany during the war, and Venezuela sold the Nazis oil during the war)

IMHO, this is too much for the general article, but it could be included here, in the more extended article on the Swiss history. Kokiri 09:18, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

---

Great. Someone's added some more details about the world wars. Originally we just had the rather curt sentence "Switzerland was not involved militarily in either world war". I corrected this with the Operation Tannenbaum reference, but steered clear of the contentious nazi gold issue. All interesting stuff though. The phrase "not involved militarily" has crept back in though. I'm not sure it is correct. Depends on your interpretation of the phrase I suppose, but it seems missleading. It was a stance of armed neutrality. The Swiss did mobilize a big army to defend themselves. It just never engaged the enemy in the end.

Quote from this article (http://www.davekopel.org/2A/OthWr/Target_Switzerland.htm) (which is bit biased)

"Threatened with attack from German and Italian forces from all sides, General Guisan devised the strategy of a delaying stand at the border, and a concentration of Swiss forces in the rugged and impassable Alps.... A fifth of the Swiss people, 850,000 out of the 4.2 million population, was under arms and mobilized... ".

Nojer2 20:44, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

• yeah, the article is very unfinished. I researched a little bit about the nazi gold, yesterday, but I didn't have enuogh time. It's certainly important that the issue is addressed in this section, but the first reparations of 1952 should be explained in greater detail, and it should also be noted that the Bergier results showed that there was certainly econoic involvement, but rather less than Switzerland had sometimes been accused of.
• the "militarily" part: Switzerland was armed, but not *involved*. To be involved in a war, you actually have to participate in combat. We can take the number (850.000) of Swiss forces from your link, (but, please, not the adjcetives). dab 08:14, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

CH Where does it stand for?

Can some one please add where CH stands for... I know it has to do with the cantons and there federation, yet I can't find any good explenation..

'Confoederatio Helvetica'. Being rather a result than an event of history, this is already covered on the more general Switzerland page.

Valtellina

I googled a date of 1623 for the loss of the Valtellina. Why does it appear again 1798? (I'm not saying that must be wrong. The happenings in Grisons were quite complicated, and I don't have any detailed knowledge of the period) dab 11:33, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The Grisons (or more precisely, the Drei Bünde) lost control over the Veltlin in the events of the Thirty Years War in the area from 1620 - 1639, when it was occupied by Spanish troops. They even lost the north-eastern parts of their territory to Austria for some time, and regained it only at the end of the war. [1] (http://www.zum.de/whkmla/region/italy/grischun16221648.html) looks pretty comprehensive and accurate, as far as I can tell. Lupo 12:09, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Another good source is [2] (http://www.lexhist.ch/externe/protect/textes/d/D28698.html). Lupo 12:14, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

that's what I had gathered. But why do we say "It lost the territory of Valtellina." under "Napoleonic era" for 1798, then? dab 12:35, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Because the Veltlin became part (or a dependency) of the Drei Bünde again after the Treaty of Westphalia and remaind so until the founding of the Cisalpine Republic by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1797? It should be 1797, and the whole thing is a bit questionable anyway, the Grisons becoming part of Switzerland only in 1803! Before that, the Drei Bünde were a close associate of the Eidgenossenschaft, but not a member. (And similarly for the Valais, by the way. Geneva, too.)Lupo 12:52, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

ok, but unless we make a History of the Grisons article, this is the place to discuss these things. I try to make it all more clear. (also, the part of the intro "foussing on the fates of the Confederacy" may have to be expanded to explicitly allow accounts of post-1291, non-confederacy events on modern swiss territory) dab 13:25, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Swiss territorial increase claim is wrong

I don't agree with the statement made in the endof the Napoleonic years section that states that at that time "Swiss territory increased for the last time". I don't have historical sources to cite, but being from Switzerland I know that Jura became a formal Swiss Canton only in 1974 or so and thus the territory changed. Unless of course Jura was fully part of Berne before and thus geographically there was not increase in territory. In any case I think it should be made clearer.

the latter is the case. Jura was split off of Berne, and the Swiss territory remained unchanged. Also, it was in 1979 (as is stated quite unambiguously right here, in the "After 1945" section). dab (T) 13:11, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)