Switzerland’s history is one of a medieval defensive league formed during a time and in an area lacking

imperial authority. The different cantons (traditionally called Orte in German) were to a large extent
independent states that remained united through the shared defense of liberty, which was understood
as the protection of imperial privileges and franchises. Unlike all similar confederations (e.g., the
Hanseatic and Swabian leagues) and despite endemic internal strife, especially after the Reformation in
the 16th century, the Swiss Confederation survived the formation of (princely) modern states without
adapting to it. With Venice, Genoa, and the Netherlands, the confederation formed the republican
exception in Europe, and it developed political structures less as a unified nation than on the level of the
13 cantons that the Swiss Confederation comprised by the time of the Reformation. The early modern
confederation also included, with reduced say, the Zugewandte Orte, districts and towns (such as
Geneva and Graubünden) that were allied to and subsequently became a party of the confederation.

Switzerland was (along with San Marino) the only early modern republic to survive the reign of
Napoleon I. It modernized its political structures in its 1848 constitution, successfully adopting liberal
principles such as individual rights, separation of powers, and parliamentary bicameralism enshrined in
the French Revolution (1789) and the U.S. Constitution. In the preceding period of crisis from the end of
the 18th century to the mid-19th century, the confederation integrated the French- and Italian-speaking
cantons and large rural areas, which earlier had been dominions of oligarchic or democratic regimes.
Thus, Switzerland avoided breaking apart like other traditional states on mountain ridges such as
Navarre or Savoy, which were destroyed by the idea of “natural boundaries,” or the Habsburg empire,
which was eventually torn apart and reduced to its German element by those espousing nationalism. A
product of the European balance of power and, after 1499, attacked only once (1798), Switzerland has
enjoyed peace for most of its existence and was spared from two world wars in the 20th century, when
the gradually developed concept of “armed neutrality” was respected by its neighbours. Economic
prosperity largely followed as Switzerland adapted well to the Industrial Revolution and the growth of
international finance markets, despite internal social strife in the decades around the turn of the 20th
century.

Switzerland before confederation

Prehistoric Switzerland

Until the late Middle Ages, the territory constituting modern Switzerland never formed a single political
or cultural unit. The first stone implements discovered in Switzerland are more than 250,000 years old,
and early human Neanderthal hunting settlements date from about 50,000 BCE. During the last glacial
period in Alpine Europe, the Würm stage, which began about 70,000 years ago, the country was covered
with ice, many thousands of feet deep, that flowed down from the Alps. Animal figures carved on
antlers and bones (e.g., those found in Kesslerloch date from about 10,000 BCE) prove that during
interglacial periods nomadic hunters had camps in caves of the ice-free areas of the Jura and the
Mittelland and followed their prey, mainly reindeer and bear, into the high mountain valleys. Toward
the end of the Würm, about 12,000 BCE, Homo sapiens appeared; after the melting of the glaciers,
Neolithic cultures established corn (maize) growing and animal breeding in parts of the Rhône and Rhine
valleys (about 5000 BCE). From about 1800 BCE, Bronze Age settlements were scattered throughout the
Mittelland and Alpine valleys.

Celtic Switzerland

During the Iron Age, from about 800 BCE on, the area that was to become Switzerland was inhabited by
Celts in the west and Raetians in the east. A rough boundary between the tribes ran from Lake
Constance to the San Bernardino by way of the Linth valley. Much of what is now known about the Celts
in western Europe during the period from approximately 400 to 50 BCE was pieced together from
information and artifacts gleaned from excavations at the lakeside encampment of La Tène, near the
modern city of Neuchâtel. The Celts were noted for their metalwork, original ceramics, and superb
jewelry crafted from gold. They first lived on single farms or in villages (of about 400 inhabitants,
according to Caesar), and later they established larger towns (oppidum). Most of the cities of the Swiss
Mittelland and of the transverse Alpine valleys were originally settled by Celts.

The Helvetii, one of the most powerful of the Celtic tribes, controlled much of the area between the Jura
and the Alps. Because of pressures from Germanic tribes, they attempted to migrate to southwestern
Gaul in 58 BCE but were denied permission by the Romans. Defeated by Julius Caesar at Bibracte
(modern Mont Beuvray, France) in the opening campaign of the Gallic Wars, the Helvetii survivors
returned to their Swiss lands as dependent but privileged allies (foederati) of Rome and thus filled a
vacuum that otherwise might have precipitated further Germanic encroachment.

Roman Switzerland

Caesar Augustus annexed present-day Switzerland to the Roman Empire in 15 BCE. The Romans
enlarged old Celtic settlements or built new military camps and towns, such as Augusta Raurica (now
Augst), on the Rhine east of Basel; Genava, Julia Equestris (Nyon), and Lousonna (Lausanne), on the
shores of Lake Geneva; Aventicum (Avenches), near Lake Morat; Eburodunum (Yverdon), on the
southwest shore of Lake Neuchâtel; and Vindonissa (Windisch) and Turicum (Zürich), where the Limmat
flows north out of Lake Zürich (Zürichsee). The Romans improved water supplies and constructed arenas
and theatres, the best examples of which may be seen at Augst and Avenches. Villas, a type of fortified
farmstead, were built, providing bases for agricultural exploitation and for spreading Roman influence
into the surrounding countryside.

New fruits, plants, and vegetables were brought from the south. The grapevine was introduced despite
attempts by Roman legislators to prevent wine from being produced north of the Alps. To facilitate
increasing exports of wheat, cattle, and cheese, as well as to provide better lines of communication for
military purposes, roads connecting Rome and the northern outposts of the empire were extended and
improved across the Mittelland. The pass routes—especially the Great Saint Bernard in the west,
between Octodurum (Martigny) and Augusta Praetoria (Aosta), and the San Bernardino, Splügen,
Septimer, and Julier passes that linked the upper Rhine valley with the south of Switzerland—were
enlarged from trails to narrow paved roads. In the peaceful period from 101 to 260 CE, few Roman
troops remained in Switzerland, and the economy and culture blossomed under civil Roman
administration; Romanization was particularly strong in the western and southern part of the region and
in Raetia in the east. By the 4th century Christianity had started to spread among the inhabitants; the
legend of the “Theban Legion”—martyrs allegedly executed near Saint-Maurice in the Valais—would
leave its mark on the Christian identity in many Swiss towns.

Germanic invasions

The first of the Germanic incursions occurred in 259–260 CE after the Roman limes (fortified strips of
land that served as military barriers to invaders) fell. Although the Romans were able to temporarily
reestablish the border at the Rhine, by 400 CE Roman Switzerland had disintegrated, and the lands of
the Romanized Celts were occupied by Germanic tribes such as the Burgundians, Alemannians, and
Langobardians (in Ticino). Few in number, the Burgundians occupied the lands of western Switzerland.
They retained political control in Switzerland but lost contact with their former homelands and were
assimilated into the Roman Celtic population. The French-speaking part of present-day Switzerland is
approximately the territory settled by the Burgundians from the 5th century onward.

Large-scale migrations of Alemannians penetrated south of the Rhine during the 6th and 7th centuries.
More numerous than the Burgundians and in direct contact with their kin north of the Rhine, the
Alemannians colonized lands that had been only partially under Roman influence, which thus facilitated
the imposition of their culture and language on the Celts. From the 6th to the 13th century, Germanic
hegemony slowly penetrated westward from the Reuss River to the Sarine. The Alemannians also
pushed farther into the upper Rhine valley, driving the Celts deeper into the Alps. Today in the valleys of
the Graubünden (Grisons), the descendants of these Celts speak Romansh, the least-prevalent of
Switzerland’s four official languages.

During the late 5th and early 6th centuries, Burgundians and Alemannians came under the control of the
Franks and thus became part of Charlemagne’s resuscitated Holy Roman Empire in the 9th century. The
Burgundians already were Roman Catholic, but the Franks let Irish and Scottish monks do missionary
work among the Alemannians; the followers of one Irish monk, St. Gall, established a monastic
settlement that became the town of Sankt Gallen. By erecting new churches and imposing their own
counts and bishops, the Franks integrated the territory that later became Switzerland into the
Carolingian empire. But less than 30 years after Charlemagne’s death, the Treaty of Verdun (843) divided
his empire, including Switzerland, among his grandsons. The middle kingdom of Lothar I included the
Burgundian settlement area west of the Aare River; it became part of an independent Burgundian
kingdom that lasted until 1033, when it again joined the Holy Roman Empire. Alemannia, north and
south of the Rhine, and Raetia were assigned in 843 to the East Frankish kingdom of Louis II (the
German). By 1000 the Swiss territories belonged to 12 different bishoprics, the largest of which were
Lausanne, Konstanz (Constance), Sion, and Chur.