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Oberhofen Castle
Oberhofen Castle is a castle in the municipality of Oberhofen of the Canton of Bern in Switzerland. It is a Swiss heritage site of national significance. History During the High Middle Ages the Freiherr von Oberhofen built Balm Castle on a hill above the village. In 1200, a daughter of the family, Ita, married into the von Eschenbach family and gave this family the castle and village. In the 13th century they began a new, moated castle on the shores of Lake Thun. One of the last owners of the castle, Walter IV von Eschenbach, was assassinated along with King Albert I in 1308 by Albert's nephew John. In 1306 the von Eschenbach family was forced to sell Oberhofen and the castle to the Habsburgs. The Habsburgs appointed a succession of vassals to administer the area for them, especially the Kyburgs who also owned Thun Castle. Following the Kyburg defeat in the Burgdorferkrieg of 1383-84 and the decisive Habsburg defeat at the Battle of Sempach in 1386, Bern began to expand ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Water Castle
A water castle is a castle whose site is largely defended by water. It can be entirely surrounded by water-filled moats (moated castle) or natural waterbodies such as island castles in a river or offshore. The term comes from European castle studies, mainly German ''Burgenkunde'', but is sometimes used in English-language popular science books and websites, and is mentioned in other more academic works. When stately homes were built in such a location, or a Wasserburg was later rebuilt as a residential manor, the German term becomes Wasserschloss, lit. "water palace/manor". Description Forde-Johnston describes such a site as "a castle in which water plays a prominent part in the defences." Apart from hindering attackers, an abundant supply of water was also an advantage during a siege. Topographically, such structures are a type of lowland castle, low-lying castle. Such a castle usually had only one entrance, which was via a drawbridge and that could be raised for protection in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
House Of Kyburg
The Kyburg family (; ; also Kiburg) was a noble family of ''grafen'' (counts) in the Duchy of Swabia, a cadet line of the counts of Dillingen, who in the late 12th and early 13th centuries ruled the County of Kyburg, corresponding to much of what is now Northeastern Switzerland. The family was one of the four most powerful noble families in the Swiss plateau (beside the House of Habsburg, the House of Zähringen and the House of Savoy) during the 12th century. With the extinction of the Kyburg family's male line in 1264, Rudolph of Habsburg laid claim to the Kyburg lands and annexed them to the Habsburg holdings, establishing the line of "Neu-Kyburg", which was in turn extinct in 1417. History Early history The first line of counts of Kyburg were influential in local politics during the 1020s, but the male line died out in 1078. Kyburg castle, southeast of Winterthur (in the modern canton of Zürich), passed on to the Swabian counts of Dillingen. Through the marriage of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Act Of Mediation
The Act of Mediation () was issued by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the French Republic on 19 February 1803 establishing the Swiss Confederation. The act also abolished the previous Helvetic Republic, which had existed since the invasion of Switzerland by French troops in 1798. After the withdrawal of French troops in July 1802, the Republic collapsed (in the '' Stecklikrieg'' civil war). The Act of Mediation was Napoleon's attempt at a compromise between the ''Ancien Régime'' and a republic. This intermediary stage of Swiss history lasted until the Restoration of 1815. The Act also destroyed the statehood of Tarasp and gave it to Graubunden. End of the Helvetic Republic Following the French invasion of 1798, the decentralized and aristocratic Old Swiss Confederation was replaced with the highly centralized and republican Helvetic Republic. However the changes were too abrupt and sweeping and ignored the strong sense of identity that most Swiss had with their canton ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canton Of Oberland
Oberland (German for ''Highlands'') was the name of a canton of the Helvetic Republic (1798–1803), corresponding to the area of the Bernese Oberland, with its capital at Thun. History After the Napoleonic invasion of Switzerland in 1798, the old Bernese order was broken up and the Oberland separated from the rest of the canton. Within the new canton, historic borders and traditional rights were not considered. As there had been no previous separatist feeling amongst the conservative population, there was little enthusiasm for the new order. The 1801 Malmaison Constitution proposed reuniting the Oberland with Bern, but it was not until the Act of Mediation, two years later, with the abolition of the Helvetic Republic and the partial restoration of the ''ancien régime'', that the two cantons were reunited. Districts During its short-lived existence, the canton was administered in ten districts, each named for the district seat, except where shown: * Aeschi * Brienz * Fru ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Helvetic Republic
The Helvetic Republic (, , ) was a sister republic of France that existed between 1798 and 1803, during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was created following the French invasion and the consequent dissolution of the Old Swiss Confederacy, marking the end of the ''ancien régime'' in Switzerland. Throughout its existence, the republic incorporated most of the territory of modern Switzerland, excluding the cantons of Geneva and Neuchâtel and the old Prince-Bishopric of Basel. The Swiss Confederacy, which until then had consisted of self-governing cantons united by a loose military alliance (and ruling over subject territories such as Vaud), was invaded by the French Revolutionary Army and turned into an ally known as the "Helvetic Republic". The interference with localism and traditional liberties was deeply resented, although some modernizing reforms took place. Resistance was strongest in the more traditional Catholic cantons, with armed uprisings breaking out in spring 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Invasion Of Switzerland
The French invasion of Switzerland (French: ''Campagne d'Helvétie'', German: ''Franzoseneinfall'') occurred from January to May 1798 as part of the French Revolutionary Wars. The independent Old Swiss Confederacy collapsed from the invasion and simultaneous internal revolts called the "Helvetic Revolution". The Swiss Ancien Régime institutions were abolished and replaced by the centralised Helvetic Republic, one of the sister republics. Background Before 1798, the modern region of Vaud belonged to the Canton of Bern, to which it had a dependent status. Moreover, the majority of Francophone Catholic Vaudois felt oppressed by the German-speaking Protestant majority of Bern. Several Vaudois patriots such as Frédéric-César de La Harpe advocated for independence. In 1795, La Harpe called on his compatriots to rise up against the Bernese aristocrats, but his appeal fell to deaf ears, and he had to flee to Revolutionary France, where he resumed his activism. In late 1797, French ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bailiwick
A bailiwick () is usually the area of jurisdiction of a bailiff, and once also applied to territories in which a privately appointed bailiff exercised the sheriff's functions under a royal or imperial writ. The bailiwick is probably modelled on the administrative organization which was attempted for a very small time in Sicily and has its roots in the official state of the Hohenstaufen. In English, the original French ''bailie'' combined with '-wic', the Anglo-Saxon suffix (meaning a village) to produce a term meaning literally 'bailiff's village'—the original geographic scope of a bailiwick. In the 19th century, it was absorbed into American English as a metaphor for a sphere of knowledge or activity. The term survives in administrative usage in the British Crown Dependencies of the Channel Islands, which are grouped for administrative purposes into two bailiwicks — the Bailiwick of Jersey (comprising the island of Jersey and uninhabited islets such as the Minquiers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Erlach Family
The Erlach family was a Bernese patrician family. They first became citizens of Bern around 1300. During the 17th and 18th Centuries they were one of the leading families in Bern. For centuries the family served as senior military commanders in both Bern and in foreign armies. They were mayors of Bern and ruled over many other towns and cities in western Switzerland. Several family members received the upper nobility title "Reichsgraf". From landless knights to mayors of Bern The Erlach family is first mentioned as a ministerialis (or unfree knight) family in the service of the Counts of Nidau. Initially they were the castellans in Erlach Castle in the town of Erlach on Lake Biel. By 1300 they were citizens of Bern and had tied their fate to the city. According to the historian Conrad Justinger, in 1339 Rudolf von Erlach led the victorious Bernese forces at the Battle of Laupen. In the following year he led a Bernese army in a raid on the city of Fribourg. Before ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patrician (post-Roman Europe)
Patricianship, the quality of belonging to a patriciate, began in the ancient world, where cities such as Ancient Rome had a social class of patrician families, whose members were initially the only people allowed to exercise many political functions. In the rise of European towns in the 12th and 13th century, the patriciate, a limited group of families with a special constitutional position, in Henri Pirenne's view, was the motive force. In 19th century Central Europe, the term had become synonymous with the upper Bourgeoisie and cannot be interchanged with the medieval patriciate in Central Europe. In German-speaking parts of Europe as well as in the maritime republics of the Italian Peninsula, the patricians were as a matter of fact the ruling body of the medieval town. Particularly in Italy, they were part of the nobility. With the establishment of the medieval towns, Italian city-states and maritime republics, the patriciate was a formally-defined social class of govern ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herrschaft (territory)
The German term ''Herrschaft'' (plural: ''Herrschaften'') covers a broad semantic field and only the context will tell whether it means, "rule", "power", "dominion", "authority", "territory" or "lordship". In its most abstract sense, it refers to power relations in general while more concretely it may refer to the individuals or institutions that exercise that power. Finally, in a spatial sense in the Holy Roman Empire, it refers to a territory over which this power is exercised.Rachel Renaul "Herrschaft", ''Histoire du Saint-Empire'' The Herrschaft as a territory The ''Herrschaft'', whose closest equivalent was the French ''seigneurie'', usually translated as "lordship" in English, denoted a specific area of land with rights over both the soil and its inhabitants. While the lord ('' Herr'') was often a noble, it could also be a commoner such as a burgher, or a corporate entity such as a bishopric, a cathedral chapter, an abbey, a hospice or a town. Most lordships were ''medi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bernese Oberland
The Bernese Oberland ( en, Bernese Highlands, german: Berner Oberland; gsw, Bärner Oberland; french: Oberland bernois), the highest and southernmost part of the canton of Bern, is one of the canton's five administrative regions (in which context it is referred to as ''Oberland'' without further specification). It constitutes the Alpine region of the canton and the northern side of the Bernese Alps, including many of its highest peaks, among which the Finsteraarhorn (), the highest in both range and canton. The region essentially coincides with the upper basin of the Aare, the latter notably comprehending Lake Thun and Lake Brienz, the two large lakes of the region. On the banks of the lakes or the Aare are the main settlements of Thun, Spiez, Interlaken, Brienz and Meiringen. The numerous side valleys of the Bernese Oberland include a large number of Alpine villages, many of them being tourist resorts and connected by mountain railways to Spiez and Interlaken. The Lötschbe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bern
german: Berner(in)french: Bernois(e) it, bernese , neighboring_municipalities = Bremgarten bei Bern, Frauenkappelen, Ittigen, Kirchlindach, Köniz, Mühleberg, Muri bei Bern, Neuenegg, Ostermundigen, Wohlen bei Bern, Zollikofen , website = www.bern.ch Bern () or Berne; in other Swiss languages, gsw, Bärn ; frp, Bèrna ; it, Berna ; rm, Berna is the ''de facto'' capital of Switzerland, referred to as the "federal city" (in german: Bundesstadt, link=no, french: ville fédérale, link=no, it, città federale, link=no, and rm, citad federala, link=no). According to the Swiss constitution, the Swiss Confederation intentionally has no "capital", but Bern has governmental institutions such as the Federal Assembly and Federal Council. However, the Federal Supreme Court is in Lausanne, the Federal Criminal Court is in Bellinzona and the Federal Administrative Court and the Federal Patent Court are in St. Gallen, exemplifying the federal nature of the Confederation. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
