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Switzerland

Historical context for the Swiss families: sources read 28 September 2026

· updated · 32 min read · 23 people named

Read on 28 September 2026 for the first written lives of the Hegnauer families outside Igis (Volketswil, Uster, Elgg, Seengen, the Luzern Seetal, Basel and Liestal, Bern, Neuchâtel). Each article was read in full on the publisher's site, in the German version of the Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS); where the German is a translation, the note says so, and the French original is the same article. The LEO-BW entry for Müllheim (Baden) is at the end. The digests are in our own words and keep to what each source says; quotations are short and only where the wording matters. They record the dated facts that can explain a Hegnauer life: economy and trades, emigration, epidemics and famines, the church and civil registers, and the dates of the Reformation and of parish arrangements. Nothing here is evidence about any Hegnauer: it is context only, to be cited in a master under the key given, with the full citation below and no occ.

How to use (the study's working notes §4): one to three sentences per life stage, placed where they explain the life; keep the source's scope (the canton is not the village); context never places a person where the records do not, and never claims a cause the records do not give. Articles read earlier and already cited in masters (HLS "Hungersnöte", "Bürgerrecht", "Hintersassen", "Hegner", "Amsoldingen", "Graubünden", "Igis", "Fünf Dörfer") are not repeated here.

Contents

Auswanderung (hlsausw)

Citation: Anne-Lise Head-König, "Auswanderung," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 1997 (print-edition article, updated 15 October 2007; translated from the French), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/007988/2007-10-15 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full. An earlier agent read it on 27 September and recorded only the 1840s (masters H0038, H0169); this note adds the rest, including the 1880s.

  • The long view. For the area of modern Switzerland, more people left than arrived from the later 16th century to the end of the 19th. Only in 1888–1900, when the economy grew and needed workers, did the balance turn towards immigration.
  • Foreign military service was the commonest form of emigration until the first third of the 19th century: about a third of men over 16 served abroad at some time in the 16th century, 20–25% in the 17th, 10–15% in the 18th.
  • Settlement emigration. After the Thirty Years' War an estimated 15,000–20,000 people from Switzerland settled in Alsace and the Franche-Comté alone (1660–1740), mostly ordinary people, rural craftsmen and farmers, largely from Aargau, Bern, Luzern and Zürich. In the 18th century settlers went to central and eastern Europe and to Britain's American colonies.
  • Overseas, 19th century. From the middle of the century emigration overseas took on new dimensions, helped by better transport and by the emigration agencies. North America took almost 90% of emigrants by the end of the century. Numbers overseas: about 50,000 in 1851–1860; about 35,000 in each of the 1860s and 1870s; over 90,000 in 1881–1890; then 40,000–50,000 a decade to 1930, and only a few thousand in the 1930s.
  • Causes. For the emigration of ordinary people, three factors above all: population pressure, poverty and underemployment. The article's chronology of crises that set off waves: falling farm prices after the Thirty Years' War; debt and bankruptcy in the 1690s; the scarcity of 1709–1711 (followed by a wave to East Prussia); trouble in textiles and watchmaking in the 1770s; war and impoverishment early in the 19th century (to Russia), with Latin America the main goal in the hunger years 1816–1817; the farming crisis of the 1840s, which with industrial restructuring set off the first mass emigration to America; and the agrarian crisis of the 1870s and 1880s, which sent farmers to America and dairy specialists to neighbouring countries.
  • In the second half of the 19th century a new kind of emigration appears, driven by the wish to do better: the choice was no longer only between work and no work, and people also left to escape what they judged poor prospects in their trade. Even early in the 20th century about 40% of emigrants came from the countryside.
  • Policy. Cantonal attitudes ranged from tolerance to prohibition, from state-aided emigration to the shipping-off of the poor. Abuses by emigration agencies led to article 34 of the Federal Constitution (1874) and a federal law of 1880 that put the agencies under federal supervision.
  • Few came back. Among civil emigrants born before about the mid-19th century, returns were rare: under 10% in the cantons studied (Glarus, Zürich, Aargau). A home commune that paid a family's Atlantic crossing often required it to renounce its citizenship. Returns grew from the mid-19th century.
  • The wars. Emigration stopped in 1914–1918, resumed early in the 1920s, then fell away when the United States restricted immigration.

Zivilstandswesen (hlszivil)

Citation: Alfred Perrenoud, "Zivilstandswesen," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2003 (print-edition article, updated 21 January 2021; translated from the French), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/007986/2021-01-21 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (an earlier agent recorded only the Zürich date of 1526, in H1450).

  • The first Swiss baptism registers date from the end of the 15th century (1481 at Porrentruy; 1490 at St Theodor in Basel).
  • Reformed cantons ordered church books soon after the Reformation: Zürich 1526, Bern 1528, Neuchâtel and Geneva 1541. Marriages were registered from the same time, together with the banns.
  • Burials were neglected by the Reformed churches, which left deaths to the civil authorities. Death registers appeared in the other Reformed cantons in the 17th century and became general only in the 18th; Bern told its pastors to keep a death register in 1708, and again in 1728.
  • Catholic cantons: the Council of Trent (1563) required baptism and marriage registers, and the Rituale Romanum (1614) added deaths. The decrees were published in central Switzerland from 1570 and in Luzern and Solothurn in 1580; most parishes began their registers only after 1600, or even 1650.
  • The Helvetic Republic's law of 15 February 1799 made the communes keep civil registers; it was repealed in 1801 and the clergy took the registers back. From 1830 civil registrars began to replace the pastors; by about 1848 most cantons kept regular registers, but not Bern, Uri, Zug, Solothurn, St Gallen, Graubünden, Ticino or Valais.
  • A federal system for reporting the figures came in 1867. The federal civil-registration law came into force in 1876, after a referendum: civil registration districts, one procedure for the whole country, and a civil registrar alone entitled to issue certificates and to marry couples. The family register kept at the place of origin (Heimatort) dates from 1928.

Mortalität (hlsmortal)

Citation: Alfred Perrenoud, "Mortalität," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2007 (print-edition article, updated 26 January 2010; translated from the French), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/007976/2010-01-26 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full. It gives national figures from 1870 and generalities for earlier centuries; it has no figures for the 17th century.

  • Under the Ancien Régime high mortality came mainly from frequent epidemics, which doubled to quintupled the deaths in a year; two-thirds of deaths were from infectious disease, and nutrition played a lesser part. Life expectancy at birth was normally 25–30 years, reaching 40 in good conditions (45 in the Geneva countryside in the mid-18th century).
  • Infant mortality (deaths under one year) was about 210 per thousand in 1870; it fell early and steadily from 1871, went below 100 in 1912, and by the First World War Switzerland had the fifth-lowest in Europe. By canton, 1871–1880, it ran from 169 per thousand (Geneva) to 301 (Appenzell Innerrhoden). Child mortality (ages one to five) fell by 40% in the last quarter of the 19th century.
  • After a fall in the 18th and early 19th centuries, infant mortality stagnated from the early 1830s and then rose, which is put down to industrialisation and more work by women. In the first half of the 19th century infant mortality was higher in the towns; Catholic districts had higher infant mortality than Reformed ones (Näfels against Mollis, early 19th century).
  • In 1880 a man of 20 had barely an even chance of reaching 60.

Weltkrieg, Erster (hlsww1)

Citation: HLS editors (introduction, translated) and Hans Rudolf Fuhrer, "Aktivdienst 1914–1918," in HLS DHS DSS, Hans Rudolf Fuhrer, Mauro Cerutti, Marc Perrenoud and Markus Bürgi, "Weltkrieg, Erster," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2006 (print-edition article, updated 5 May 2015), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/008926/2015-05-05 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read: the introduction and the sections on the military situation and active service, 1914–1918.

  • The assassination at Sarajevo on 28 June 1914 set off the war; within a few days (1–4 August) Austria and Germany were at war with Serbia, Russia, France and Britain.
  • After Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia (28 July) and Russia mobilised (30 July), the Federal Council put the whole army on alert on 31 July and ordered general mobilisation on 1 August 1914; about 220,000 men reported for active service between 3 and 7 August. Ulrich Wille was elected general.
  • From September 1914 a rota released men for farms and industry; the numbers under arms fell to 38,000 in November 1916 and rose again over 100,000 in the winter of 1916–1917. Switzerland was not attacked but suffered from the length of the war and the Allied blockade.

Volketswil (hlsvolk)

Citation: Ueli Müller, "Volketswil," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2012 (print-edition article, updated 19 September 2017), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000136/2017-09-19 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full again. Earlier notes: Hegnau and Hegnau stories: Vom Guggu und andere wahre Hegnauer Geschichten (VOV, 2010) (read 27 September), cited as hlsvolk in H1151 and H1869. The HLS has no article on Hegnau itself.

  • The commune takes in Volketswil, Hegnau, Zimikon, Kindhausen and Gutenswil. Population: about 155 in 1467; 405 in 1634; 1,095 in 1738; 2,028 in 1850; 1,515 in 1900.
  • An early medieval cemetery at Hegnau points to Alemannic settlement in the 6th or 7th century. The lords of Hegnau (13th century) were probably ministeriales of the counts of Rapperswil.
  • Hegnau came to Zürich in 1402 with the lordship of Greifensee and belonged to the bailiwick of Greifensee until 1798; the high and low courts of the other villages came to Zürich with the county of Kyburg (1424, 1452), and they stayed in the bailiwick of Kyburg until 1798. In 1798 the new commune was put in the district of Uster.
  • Church: all five villages belonged to the parish of Uster. Hegnau's chapel of Our Lady dates from the 13th century (first mentioned 1503/04); the chapel of St Agatha at Volketswil is first mentioned 1369/70. In 1638 Volketswil became a parish of its own, with Zürich's Small Council as collator; Gutenswil was added to it in 1767.
  • Charters of settlement (Einzugsbriefe): Volketswil 1573, Hegnau 1589, Gutenswil 1650; Kindhausen a commune charter in 1794. In the 19th century the five villages had their own school and civil communes (dissolved 1919 and 1931).
  • Textile home work spread in the 17th and 18th centuries and employed about 40% of the people in 1787. With no water power, no factories came in the 19th century. After the Zürich–Uster road was improved and a new road built from Hegnau to Fehraltorf about 1840, Hegnau grew along the street.

Greifensee (Herrschaft, Vogtei) (hlsgreifensee)

Citation: Bruno Schmid, "Greifensee (Herrschaft, Vogtei)," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2002 (print-edition article, updated 13 January 2006), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/007824/2006-01-13 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (a source the Volketswil writer asked for).

  • The castle of Greifensee, probably founded by the counts of Rapperswil, was the centre of the lordship. The pledge of 1300 lists its estates: the town and lake of Greifensee, Fällanden, Maur, Niederuster, Uster, Nossikon, Nänikon, Werrikon, Schwerzenbach, Hegnau and others. The Landenbergs sold it in 1369 to the counts of Toggenburg.
  • In 1402 Count Friedrich VII of Toggenburg pledged the lordship to Zürich for 6,000 gulden; it was never redeemed. It became Zürich's first outer bailiwick, its bailiff living at the castle (1402–1798). Its high court did not include capital justice, which lay with Kyburg and Grüningen. It was the most fragmented of Zürich's bailiwicks.
  • In the Helvetic Republic its core became the district of Uster; the Restoration's Oberamt Greifensee already matched the district of Uster (from 1831).

Uster (hlsuster)

Citation: Bruno Schmid, "Uster," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2012 (print-edition article, updated 14 January 2014), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000135/2014-01-14 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • Population: about 600 in 1467; 972 in 1634; 1,699 in 1694; 2,191 in 1722; 3,128 in 1799; 5,081 in 1850; 7,623 in 1900.
  • The parish church of St Andreas, founded by the Rapperswils, is first mentioned 1099; it was pulled down in 1823 and the new Reformed church consecrated in 1824. The parish of Uster included Volketswil, Hegnau, Zimikon, Kindhausen and Isikon until 1638, Greifensee until 1544, Gutenswil until 1767 and Heusberg until 1770.
  • In 1668 a plague killed a third of the people of the parish of Uster.
  • In the 18th century the upper Glatt valley, Uster with it, was among the areas of Europe with the highest share of home industry: by the end of the century about half the population worked in the cotton trade (the cantonal average was 26%).
  • 1798 district capital; again from 1803 and 1831. The Ustertag (22 November 1830) opened the liberal Regeneration in Zürich, though Uster itself played little part; on 22 November 1832 home workers from the Oberland burned the mechanical weaving mill of Corrodi & Pfister (the Usterbrand).
  • 19th century: spinning and weaving mills (Heinrich Kunz, the "spinning king"; Hans Heinrich Zangger) harnessed the Aa, and the stretch from Wetzikon to Niederuster became one of the most densely industrialised areas in Europe. After floods in 1876 and 1878 the stream was straightened (by 1890). A severe textile crisis cut the cotton-spinning workforce by 1901 to little more than half its size in 1855; the Leihkasse Uster (founded 1862) collapsed in 1891. Railway from Uster to Wallisellen in 1856. A secondary school from 1834. The foreign share rose to 16% by 1910, mostly Italian Catholics; a Catholic church was built in 1884.

Elgg (hlselgg)

Citation: Ueli Müller, "Elgg," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2002 (print-edition article, updated 5 October 2020), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000144/2020-10-05 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (the Elgg masters H1450 and H1474 had used the medieval part).

  • Population: about 440 in the parish in 1467; 1,018 in 1634; 2,103 in 1792 (parish); 1,038 in 1836 (political commune); 1,182 in 1850; 1,420 in 1900.
  • Market rights 1370, town rights 1371. Zürich took the high court with the county of Kyburg (1424, 1452) and placed Elgg in the Enneramt of the bailiwick of Kyburg until 1798. The castle and low court passed from the Habsburgs to the lords of Hinwil (1442), were bought in 1576 by Hans Heinrich Lochmann of Zürich, and in 1712 by Hans Felix Werdmüller; the Werdmüllers gave up the low court in 1798. In 1798 the parish was divided into the political communes of Elgg and Hofstetten.
  • Church: St Georg, rebuilt 1508–1516, the most important late-Gothic church of the Zürich countryside. The patronage passed from St Gallen to the Bonstettens (1346), Rapperswil (1409) and Zürich (1537). The old parish included Hofstetten, Schottikon, parts of Bertschikon and Hagenbuch, and the Thurgau villages Ettenhausen, Guntershausen, Iltishausen and Tänikon. Zürich imposed the Reformation in 1524 against strong resistance; late in the 16th century the Thurgau villages, which had returned to the old faith, left the parish.
  • Trades: a small market and craft town on the Winterthur–Wil road, with three taverns. Linen-making and the linen trade flourished in the 15th and 16th centuries; besides builders, goldsmiths and clockmakers came potters (the Spiller dynasty) in the 17th and 18th centuries, and comb-makers and pewterers in the 18th. By 1798 fewer than 30% of the town's households lived by farming alone. Lignite was mined at the Schneitberg from about 1763 to 1837 for steel and earthenware works and a glassworks. A mechanical workshop came in 1826 and a cardboard factory in 1840. Three fires, in 1870 and twice in 1876, destroyed nearly half the town. Railway Winterthur–Wil 1855; embroidery works from 1872 (later a shoe factory).

Sirnach (hlssirnach)

Citation: Erich Trösch, "Sirnach," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2010 (print-edition article, updated 19 December 2012), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001964/2012-12-19 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (asked for by the Elgg writer).

  • In the canton of Thurgau, in the Murg valley (district of Münchwilen). The old municipal commune had 3,018 people in 1850; the village itself 500.
  • With Büfelden and Gloten, Sirnach belonged to the lordship (Amt) of Tannegg, which passed to the abbey of Fischingen in 1693 (until 1798); the church had been incorporated into Fischingen in 1362.
  • The parish took the Reformation in 1529, but the Mass was restored in 1568, and Catholics and Reformed shared the church until 1934. The Reformed of Sirnach built their own church only in 1937.
  • Three-field farming until the 19th century. After the railway (1855–1856) a weaving mill (1857) employed at times over 300 people.

Pfyn (hlspfyn)

Citation: Erich Trösch, "Vom Mittelalter bis in die Gegenwart," section of Albin Hasenfratz, Hansjörg Brem and Erich Trösch, "Pfyn," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2009 (print-edition article, updated 28 September 2010), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001982/2010-09-28 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full; the section used is Erich Trösch's.

  • On the Thur between Frauenfeld and Steckborn (canton of Thurgau). The village had 533 people in 1831 and 789 in 1850.
  • The cathedral chapter of Konstanz was the landlord; the bailiwick passed through several hands to the city of Zürich in 1614, which installed a bailiff (Obervogt) until 1798.
  • The church of St Bartholomäus, inside the Roman fort, was the centre of a large early parish. Pfyn took the Reformation in 1528, but most of the parish's other villages stayed Catholic, and a Catholic priest was installed again in 1533; the two confessions have shared the church ever since. In the 18th century most of Pfyn's people were Reformed.
  • Fruit-growing; a cheese dairy at the castle in 1822 and in the village in 1879; Heinrich Bertschinger's cotton-spinning mill of 1858.

Seengen (hlsseengen)

Citation: Felix Müller, "Seengen," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2010 (print-edition article, updated 30 October 2012), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001773/2012-10-30 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • In the canton of Aargau (district of Lenzburg), at the north end of Lake Hallwil, with Schloss Hallwyl and Brestenberg. Population: 752 in 1764; 1,628 in 1831; 1,528 in 1850; 1,353 in 1900; 1,267 in 1920. The village shrank through most of the 19th century.
  • High justice with the Habsburgs and, from 1415, with Bern; the low court with the lords of Hallwyl. A schoolhouse from 1686; two annual fairs from 1763.
  • Church: St Mauritius, first mentioned 1185, rebuilt about 1490 and in 1820. Its parish took in Meisterschwanden, Tennwil and Alliswil (and in the 14th century Egliswil, Hallwil and part of Boniswil); Fahrwangen joined after the Reformation. Fahrwangen, Meisterschwanden and Tennwil formed their own Reformed parish in 1817. The patronage lay with the Knights Hospitaller of Küsnacht and, after the commandery was dissolved, with the canton of Zürich, which is why Seengen's pastors came from Zürich; it passed to Aargau in 1837.
  • Economy: grain-growing farms and vines (about 25 ha around 1800, 47 ha in 1857). Cotton work brought extra earnings from the mid-18th century; early in the 19th century straw-plaiting replaced it, first for manufacturers at Wohlen and from the 1850s for Seengen firms. A cheese co-operative is recorded in 1866 and the shift to dairy farming was strong. A home for poor children (Friedberg) opened in 1851, a district school in 1864.
  • "Seit den 1870er Jahren stagnierte die Wirtschaft": from the 1870s the economy stagnated, above all because Seengen got no railway, and the lake steamers from 1888 were no real substitute. The straw industry disappeared again (the last firm became a tool factory in 1933).

Würenlos (hlswuerenlos)

Citation: Peter Witschi, "Würenlos," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2013 (print-edition article, updated 26 November 2013), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001659/2013-11-26 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • In the canton of Aargau (district of Baden), where the Furt valley meets the Limmat. Population: 428 in 1634; 647 in 1780; 1,047 in 1850.
  • From 1415 part of the Confederates' common bailiwick of Baden; from 1421 the low court and the church patronage belonged to the nearby abbey of Wettingen.
  • The large parish (first mentioned 1275) had daughter churches at Otelfingen, Boppelsen and Unteroetwil. From 1532 Catholics and Reformed shared the parish church of St Maria and Antonius; there were separate Catholic and Reformed schools until 1896, and each confession got its own church only in 1937.
  • A farming village until the mid-20th century; railway 1877.

Otelfingen (hlsotelfingen)

Citation: Martin Illi, "Otelfingen," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2008 (print-edition article, updated 21 September 2010), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000074/2010-09-21 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (for the Würenlos entry of 1817 in H0952).

  • A village of the canton of Zürich (district of Dielsdorf) in the Furt valley, on the Aargau border; with the lordship of Regensberg it passed to the city of Zürich in 1409. Population 256 in 1634; 344 in 1799; 575 in 1850.
  • In the late Middle Ages it belonged to the parish of Würenlos (incorporated into Wettingen abbey in 1421), with its own chapel of St Othmar. Because the mother church of Würenlos returned to the old faith in 1532, Otelfingen kept the pastor it had installed in 1528 and made its chapel into a church (1554–1555). The Reformed parish took in the Reformed who remained at Würenlos, and Boppelsen (and from 1868 Hüttikon). Wettingen kept the patronage until 1838.

Baden (AG, Gemeinde) (hlsbaden)

Citation: Andreas Steigmeier, "Frühmittelalter bis heute," section of Andreas Steigmeier and Martin Hartmann, "Baden (AG, Gemeinde)," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2001 (print-edition article, updated 19 December 2024), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001633/2024-12-19 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read: the section from the early Middle Ages to the present (for the Hegnauer marriages indexed under "Baden, Aargau", 1813–1869).

  • A Catholic town and the centre of the common bailiwick of Baden; the Confederates' Diet met there often from 1416, and its baths drew visitors from the late Middle Ages. After the Peace of Aarau (1712) a Reformed church was built at Baden in 1714, used at first only by Reformed guests at the baths and by the bailiff's staff. In the 19th century industry brought a strong mixing of the confessions (1910: 3,658 Reformed, 4,169 Catholics).
  • 1798 capital of the Helvetic canton of Baden; from 1803 a district town of Aargau. The spa revived in the 19th century; the first factory, a spinning mill, came in 1835; the railway from Zürich in 1847. The bankruptcy of the Nationalbahn (1878) threw the town into a crisis that ended with the arrival of Brown, Boveri & Cie. in 1891.

Pfeffikon (hlspfeffikon)

Citation: Waltraud Hörsch, "Pfeffikon," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2008 (print-edition article, updated 4 November 2016), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000648/2016-11-04 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • A former commune of the canton of Luzern (part of Rickenbach since 2013), on the eastern slope of the Stierenberg in the upper Wyna valley, bordered by Aargau on three sides. Population: about 110 in 1456; about 342 around 1695; 496 in 1850.
  • Church: St Mauritius, first mentioned 1045, the centre of a great parish (Pfeffikon, Reinach, Menziken, Burg, Gontenschwil, Beinwil, Leimbach, Witwil and farms near Rickenbach and Beromünster) until it was incorporated into the chapter of Beromünster in 1346. The chapter held sixteen of the Pfeffikon farms and the low court. The high court passed from the Habsburgs to the city of Luzern in 1415, and Pfeffikon was put in the Michelsamt. The church collapsed and was rebuilt (consecrated 1541), and after a village fire in 1679 it was remodelled in baroque style (1680–1684). The parish shrank further with the Reformation, and again in 1806; since 1812 it has been a small parish.
  • Farming: grain in three fields, some grassland and cattle. A Luzern toll station 1765–1848. The cigar factory later known as Villiger Söhne was founded in 1888.

Schongau (hlsschongau)

Citation: Waltraud Hörsch, "Schongau," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2010 (print-edition article, updated 23 October 2012), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000612/2012-10-23 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • In the canton of Luzern (Amt Hochdorf), on the western slope of the Lindenberg above Lake Hallwil, on the Aargau border: the villages of Ober-, Mettmen- and Niederschongau, the hamlet of Rüedikon and many single farms. Population: about 775 around 1695; 846 in 1798; 1,077 in 1850.
  • Church rights and justice belonged to the chapter of Beromünster by 1036. From 1420 to 1798 Schongau was a detached part (exclave) of Luzern's bailiwick of the Michelsamt; in 1803 it came to the Amt Hochdorf. The lords of Hallwyl held Muri abbey's manor court there as a fief from about 1354–1361 to 1798.
  • The parish church at Oberschongau was incorporated into Beromünster in 1358, rebuilt about 1500 and enlarged about 1700; a Marian pilgrimage there probably began early in the 17th century. Rüedikon moved from the parish of Hitzkirch to Schongau in 1808.
  • The Luzern council allowed common land to be divided and leased to the farmers and cottagers (Tauner) in 1571/1581. Three largely self-governing village communities shared one court and one citizenship. Farming: grain in the three-field system, much fruit, some wine until the 19th century. In the 1760s people from Schongau emigrated to Spain. Home industry mattered somewhat in the early modern period (a silk putter-out about 1770, five cotton putters-out in 1787); straw-plaiting schools from 1834.

Hochdorf (Gemeinde) and (Vogtei, Amt) (hlshochdorf, hlshochdorfamt)

Citations:

  • hlshochdorf: Othmar Wey and Waltraud Hörsch, "Hochdorf (Gemeinde)," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2005 (print-edition article, updated 18 December 2007), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000602/2007-12-18 (accessed 28 September 2026).
  • hlshochdorfamt: Waltraud Hörsch, "Hochdorf (Vogtei, Amt)," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2004 (print-edition article, updated 23 December 2004), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/011151/2004-12-23 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Both read in full.

  • Hochdorf, in the upper Seetal (Luzern), with Baldegg, Urswil and part of Ligschwil. Population: about 300 in 1456; about 1,970 around 1695; 1,077 in 1798; 1,370 in 1850.
  • Conquered by Luzern in 1386 (Sempach war); from about 1418 part of the bailiwick of Rothenburg (the Outer Office, or Amt Hochdorf). In 1803 the Amt Hochdorf was formed and enlarged with the Freiamt district of Hitzkirch and the exclaves of Ermensee and Schongau.
  • An early great parish (with Hohenrain, Ballwil and parts of the Berghof); the church of St Martin belonged to Beromünster by 1036 and was incorporated in 1302; Hochdorf has been the seat of a deanery since the late Middle Ages. The baroque church was built in 1757–1758. The parish was much reduced in 1804.
  • A market town and craft centre from the late Middle Ages (butchers, bakers, craft brotherhoods, a dye works), from the 17th century the craft centre of the Amt Rothenburg; a toll station 1677–1803; spas from 1781. Industry came after the Seetal railway (1883).

Basel-Stadt (hlsbaselstadt)

Citation: Hans Berner and Niklaus Röthlin, "Gesellschaft, Wirtschaft und Kultur von der Reformation bis zur Kantonstrennung," and Bernard Degen and Philipp Sarasin, "Verfassungsgeschichte und Staatstätigkeit seit der Kantonstrennung" and "Gesellschaft, Wirtschaft und Kultur im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert," sections of Bernard Degen et al., "Basel-Stadt," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2002 (print-edition article, updated 30 May 2017), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/007478/2017-05-30 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read: the sections on the town from the Reformation to 1833, on the constitution and the state since 1833, and on society, economy and culture in the 19th and 20th centuries (the prehistory and medieval sections were skimmed). The HLS has no separate article for the town of Basel after 1833; this is it.

  • Reformation: Basel's council introduced the Reformation for town and countryside in 1529 (the Basel Reformation Order of Oecolampadius; the Basel Confession of 1534). The church stayed firmly under the council.
  • The town had about 15,000 people at the end of the 18th century (14,678 in 1798; 16,674 in 1815), still inside its medieval walls. Its last plague was in 1668. Admissions to the citizenship were few after the 17th century; Catholics could acquire Basel citizenship only from 1848.
  • Economy: silk-ribbon making dominated the town, and through putting-out much of the countryside, from the late 17th century into the 19th. Mechanisation came from 1824; from 1840 factory jobs in ribbon-making outnumbered home work in the town. In 1843 about 1,500 people worked in mechanical ribbon factories, while about 10,000 in the countryside wove ribbons at home. In 1870 about 6,600 people worked in the town's factories, 78% of them in silk. In the second half of the 19th century Basel became the largest industrial town in Switzerland. Guild restrictions on most crafts lasted until 1871. The chemical industry began in 1859 but stayed small until about 1900.
  • Growth: in the boom years of the 1850s, 1870s and 1890s two-thirds of the growth came from people moving in; until the end of the century most newcomers were Swiss citizens. The walls came down after the law of 27 June 1859. The well-off moved out of the crowded old town (cholera in 1855, typhus in 1865); poorer newcomers stayed in its overcrowded streets until workers' housing was built after 1890.
  • Laws: compulsory schooling for ages 6–12 from 1838; after strikes in the ribbon-weaving trade, a factory law of 1869 set a twelve-hour day and banned child labour. With industrialisation Catholic workers moved in, and by 1880 Protestants were two-thirds of the people.
  • The canton: since 26 August 1833 a half-canton, made up of the town and three villages (Riehen, Bettingen, Kleinhüningen).

Basel-Landschaft (hlsbaselland)

Citation: Sibylle Rudin-Bühlmann, "Verfassungs- und politische Geschichte," and Kaspar Birkhäuser, "Bevölkerung und Siedlung," "Wirtschaft" and "Gesellschaft" (to the end of the 19th century) and "Kirchliches und religiöses Leben," sections of Bernard Degen et al., "Basel-Landschaft," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2002 (print-edition article, updated 29 May 2017), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/007477/2017-05-29 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read: the state and politics sections to 1900, and the population, economy, society and church sections in full.

  • A half-canton since 1833: the constitution of 27 April 1832 and the Diet's decision of 26 August 1833 separated it from the town; its capital is Liestal. At its founding, about four-fifths of the people were Protestant.
  • Society at the founding: a mostly poor rural society. Nearly half the people lived from farming, as farmers or as landless day labourers (Tauner); nearly a quarter of household heads were silk-ribbon weavers (Posamenter) working at home on looms for the Basel ribbon merchants (about 3,500 looms in 1836, a peak of 4,909 in 1880), mostly in the upper districts and usually alongside farming. Women were a large part of the workforce (in home industry 73% in 1905).
  • 41,120 people at the first reliable census, 1837. From the mid-19th century, with freedom of settlement (1848) and the railways, people moved away to the towns, above all to Basel, a drift that lasted about a century. The last epidemics: smallpox 1885, typhus 1890, influenza 1918.
  • Economy: two-thirds of workers were in farming in the 1830s, a quarter by 1900; the shift from grain to cattle came with cheap imported grain. The Schweizerhalle saltworks (from 1837) paid so well that the canton levied no permanent direct tax until 1892. Railway Basel–Liestal 1854.
  • Hard times: the farming crises of the 1870s and 1880s and, after 1890, the crisis of ribbon weaving impoverished much of the population. About 12,000 people emigrated from the Baselbiet in the 19th century, mostly to North America.
  • The revised Federal Constitution of 1874 abolished the legal restrictions on marriage.

Liestal (Gemeinde) (hlsliestal)

Citation: Dominik Wunderlin and Jürg Ewald, "Liestal (Gemeinde)," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2007 (print-edition article, updated 14 January 2010), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001211/2010-01-14 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • A small town on a rock spur between the Ergolz and the Orisbach, on the road from Basel to the Hauenstein passes; sold by the bishop of Basel to the town of Basel in 1400.
  • Reformation 1529, by order of the Basel council. In the Peasants' War of 1653 the town lost its privileges.
  • Crafts: in 1774 the town of about 1,500 people had 10 tailors, 29 shoemakers, 3 glove-makers, 7 stocking-weavers, 9 linen and 4 wool weavers, 17 coopers and 6 turners, working for the surrounding country too; most also kept some land and vines. Ribbon looms: 8 in 1770, 44 in 1786.
  • Liestal's craftsmen led the countryside against the town: a petition of July 1790 (serfdom partly abolished on 27 December 1790); in January 1798 one of the first liberty trees in Switzerland was raised there. In the Basel troubles of 1830–1833 Liestal took the lead: the first provisional government of the countryside was formed there in 1831; the town's troops bombarded and occupied it; after the separation (1832–1833) Liestal became the capital of Basel-Landschaft.
  • Industry: a dye works, bleachery and fulling mill of Ambrosius Rosenmund (about 1825); a weaving mill founded by Michael Spinnler in the Oristal in 1826; the Schwarz firm on the Frenke from 1862 (later Hanro). In 1878 Liestal had nine factories with 325 workers, and it stayed the most industrialised place in the canton until 1940. Railway to Basel 1854. A typhus epidemic caused by the Oristal spring killed 21 people in 1890.
  • Schools: the first Realschule of the Basel countryside in 1820. Catholic services again from 1835; a Catholic church in 1866.

Bern (Gemeinde) (hlsbern)

Citation: Urs Martin Zahnd, "Vom Hochmittelalter bis zum Ende des Ancien Régime," Bruno Fritzsche, "Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft" (19th and 20th centuries), and Alfred Kuert, "Kulturelles und religiöses Leben," sections of Anne-Marie Dubler et al., "Bern (Gemeinde)," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2002 (print-edition article, updated 10 November 2016), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000209/2016-11-10 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read: the sections from the high Middle Ages to 1798 and on the 19th and 20th centuries (not the prehistory).

  • Reformation 1528 (the Disputation; the Synod of 1532). Afterwards the whole town remained a single parish, with the Minster as its church, until the Nydegg chapel and the Holy Ghost church became parish churches in 1721; a decree of 1720 divided the town into five Reformed parishes. The French-speaking Protestants had the former Dominican church from 1623 (their own parish from 1689).
  • The town grew in the 16th, 17th and above all 18th centuries, but births barely exceeded deaths: until the 19th century its growth depended on people moving in from the countryside. The first censuses were in 1764.
  • Society: after 1651, when Bern stopped in principle admitting new burghers, the townspeople fell into four legal groups: journeymen, servants and day labourers as Hintersassen, without political rights; foreign merchants and manufacturers as "perpetual residents"; the burghers (craftsmen, clergy, officials); and the ruling families (139 in 1651, 77 in 1745). Crafts stagnated in the 17th and 18th centuries. An orphanage existed from 1657 to 1684.
  • 19th century: between 1798 and 1838 the number of houses grew by only 93 while the population doubled; people per house rose from 7.4 to 13.9, a sign that the poorer classes were crowding into the old town. The fortifications came down from 1807 to 1846. Bern became the federal city at the end of 1848; the railway arrived in 1857–1858. The first Catholic church since the Reformation was consecrated in 1864.

Muri bei Bern (hlsmuri)

Citation: Anne-Marie Dubler, "Muri bei Bern," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2007 (print-edition article, updated 3 July 2009), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000214/2009-07-03 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (asked for by the Bern writer).

  • The villages of Muri and Gümligen, on terraces above the right bank of the Aare. Population 446 in 1764; 1,142 in 1850. After 1298 Muri was one of the four parishes of Bern's wider town district and, until 1798, a low court of the town.
  • The church patronage came to Bern with the Reformation in 1528. The parish reached to the edge of the town (Melchenbühl, Wittigkofen, Brunnadern); that western part passed to the town of Bern in 1817. The political commune was formed within the parish in 1831–1833.
  • From the 16th century the patricians built country houses there; a school is first mentioned in 1679. Railways from 1859 (station at Gümligen).

Wahlern (hlswahlern)

Citation: Anne-Marie Dubler, "Wahlern," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2012 (print-edition article, updated 4 November 2014), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/000483/2014-11-04 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (asked for by the Bern writer).

  • A former commune of the canton of Bern (district of Schwarzenburg), scattered farms and the village of Schwarzenburg in the hills between the Sense and the Schwarzwasser; merged into Schwarzenburg in 2011. Population 3,260 in 1777; 5,414 in 1850; 5,183 in 1900.
  • Part of the bailiwick of Grasburg (from 1575 the bailiwick of Schwarzenburg). The church, first mentioned 1228, stands on a hill; its tower dates from 1511. Bern imposed the Reformation against Fribourg's opposition, in the parish church in 1529 and in the chapel at Schwarzenburg in 1532. Bern acquired the patronage in 1729.

Schiers (hlsschiers)

Citation: Otto Clavuot, "Schiers," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 1999 (print-edition article, updated 24 April 2020), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/001609/2020-04-24 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full (asked for by the Bern writer).

  • The centre of the lower Prättigau (Graubünden). Population 1,110 in 1780; 1,741 in 1850; 1,654 in 1900.
  • Austrian rule 1496–1649. The Reformation came in 1563. Church and village were destroyed twice: by an Austrian army in 1622 and by a village fire in 1767.
  • About 1800 at least 80% of the people lived by cattle-farming (with alpine pastures) and crops. The valley road (1849) and the railway (1889) encouraged people to move. Organ-building in the first half of the 19th century. A teachers' seminary (the Evangelical school) from 1837, the regional hospital from 1881.

La Chaux-de-Fonds (hlschauxdefonds)

Citation: Jean-Marc Barrelet, "Chaux-de-Fonds, La," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 1998 (print-edition article, updated 25 February 2010; translated from the French), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/002837/2010-02-25 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • In the Neuchâtel Jura, at almost 1,000 m, near the French border. Reformed about 1530 with the rest of the lordship of Valangin.
  • Watchmaking: it spread along the Jura from Geneva in the 18th century as extra work for farmers and craftsmen, organised from early in the century in the divided putting-out system of établissage. After the crisis of 1816–1817 it became the dominant trade: about 4,000 people, nearly a third of the population, worked directly in watchmaking in 1847. After the great fire of 1794 the town was quickly rebuilt, and a plan of 1835 laid out its growth on a grid along the valley.
  • Growth: the population doubled between 1815 and 1849 and tripled between 1850 and 1910, through strong in-migration, above all from the canton of Bern; in 1880, 30% of the people were German-speaking. A German church was built in 1853. In 1870, 4,505 of 8,954 people in work were in watchmaking. Late in the 19th century production moved from scattered home workshops to mechanised small factories; trade unions and professional bodies followed. A watchmaking school was founded in 1865, later joined by a school of applied art for goldsmiths and engravers. Railway 1857.
  • After the Neuchâtel revolution of 1 March 1848 La Chaux-de-Fonds became the economic centre of the canton. Karl Marx (1867) called it one great watch factory.

Uhrenindustrie (hlsuhren)

Citation: Estelle Fallet and Béatrice Veyrassat, "Uhrenindustrie," Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS), version of 2005 (print-edition article, updated 11 August 2020; translated from the French), hls-dhs-dss.ch/de/articles/013976/2020-08-11 (accessed 28 September 2026).

Read in full.

  • In the Neuchâtel mountains watchmaking spread from the 17th century; with no guilds, and free production and trade, Geneva makers had work done there. Watchmakers often employed the whole family and married within the trade.
  • A factory census of 1867 at La Chaux-de-Fonds counted 54 separate watchmaking trades.
  • The American crisis: standardised, machine-made cheap watches from the United States from the mid-century nearly ruined the Swiss industry. Swiss watch exports to the United States fell from 18.3 million francs in 1872 to 3.5–4 million in 1877–1878. The industry turned to machine production in large factories (the Bernese Jura and the foot of the Jura; 97 watch factories under the federal factory law in 1883, 46 of them in Bern), while the old centres kept to luxury and complicated work. Between 1884 and 1914 watch workers struck 193 times.
  • About 1870 Switzerland made about three-quarters of the world's watches. By about 1890 half the watches for export came from Bernese workshops.

Müllheim, Baden (LEO-BW) (leobwmuellheim)

Citation: Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg, "Müllheim – Altgemeinde~Teilort," Historisches Ortslexikon, LEO-BW (Landeskunde entdecken online Baden-Württemberg), leo-bw.de/web/guest/detail-gis/-/Detail/details/ORT/labw_ortslexikon/8698/M%C3%BCllheim, with the entry for the town, "Müllheim," leo-bw.de/web/guest/detail-gis/-/Detail/details/ORT/labw_ortslexikon/8686/M%C3%BCllheim (both accessed 28 September 2026).

Read: both entries' historical texts (history, church and school, Jewish community, the arms). The site names no author; it is the Landesarchiv's place-name lexicon.

  • First recorded in 758 (villa Mulinheimo). It belonged to the lordship of Badenweiler, which came to the margraves of Baden in 1503; from 1727 the seat of the lordship's administration.
  • Originally two villages (Ober- and Niedermüllheim) that grew together from the early 17th century; burned in 1633.
  • Seat of a new Baden district office (Bezirksamt) from 1809, and a town from 1810, with a mayor and seven councillors; a new town hall in 1867.
  • Church: the Protestant parish church of St Martin (rebuilt in the 15th century) served until the new neo-Gothic Protestant church was built in 1876–1881; the old church was taken out of use in 1881. Catholic services were held in the cemetery chapel from 1850 to 1878; a Catholic curacy was set up in 1866 and a Catholic parish in 1881.
  • A large Jewish community (422 people at its peak in 1864), with a synagogue destroyed in 1938.
  • The town calls itself the centre of the Markgräflerland; it lies on the Rhine valley railway.

Not found or not read

  • Hegnau: the HLS has no article on the village (confirmed 28 Sep 2026). Use HLS "Volketswil" and "Greifensee".
  • Canton Zürich (HLS "Zürich (Kanton)"), for Volketswil in the 1670s–1700s: not read today. The Volketswil, Uster and Greifensee articles cover the parish, the bailiwick and home industry; the canton article would add the Zürich state church and poor relief.
  • Child mortality in the 1670s: no HLS article gives Swiss figures for the 17th century. HLS "Mortalität" gives the Ancien Régime pattern (epidemics; life expectancy 25–30), and HLS "Uster" records the plague of 1668 in the parish of Uster.
  • Neuchâtel (commune): not read; the Neuchâtel lives use La Chaux-de-Fonds and "Uhrenindustrie".

Use in the study (the review of 28–29 September 2026)

Where each source was cited in the new lives. Sources not listed were read but explained no life closely enough to be cited.

  • hlsausw (the 1880s): H0522, H0524, H0534
  • hlszivil: H0950, H1110 (civil registers from 1876), H1266 (Bern's death registers from 1708), H1912 (Luzern's registers from 1580); earlier H1450 and H1889 (Zürich, 1526)
  • hlsmortal and hlsuster (the plague of 1668): H1869, as a labelled inference in Research Notes
  • hlsww1 (the summer of 1914): H0534
  • hlsuster (cotton home industry): H0950, H0952
  • hlswuerenlos, hlsotelfingen: H0952
  • hlsseengen: H0522, H0534
  • hlsbaden: H1110
  • hlselgg: H0820
  • hlssirnach: H0846
  • hlspfyn, hlsschiers, hlsbern (Fritzsche): H1264
  • hlsbern (Zahnd), hlsmuri: H1266
  • hlspfeffikon: H1912
  • hlsschongau: H1143
  • hlsbaselstadt, leobwmuellheim: H1172
  • hlsliestal: H1161
  • hlschauxdefonds: H0492, H0499
  • Read but not yet cited: hlsgreifensee, hlshochdorf, hlshochdorfamt, hlsbaselland, hlswahlern, hlsuhren.

People in this article