Seehof (Elay in French) is a
municipality
A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate.
The term ''municipality' ...
in the
Jura bernois administrative district in the
canton
Canton may refer to:
Administrative divisions
* Canton (administrative division), territorial/administrative division in some countries
* Township (Canada), known as ''canton'' in Canadian French
Arts and entertainment
* Canton (band), an It ...
of
Bern
Bern (), or Berne (), ; ; ; . is the ''de facto'' Capital city, capital of Switzerland, referred to as the "federal city".; ; ; . According to the Swiss constitution, the Swiss Confederation intentionally has no "capital", but Bern has gov ...
in
Switzerland
Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...
. It is one of two municipalities with German as its official language in the otherwise French-speaking
Bernese Jura
Bernese Jura (, , German: Berner Jura) is the name for the French-speaking area of the Switzerland, Swiss canton of Bern, and from 2010 one of ten Administrative divisions of Switzerland, administrative divisions of the Cantons of Switzerland, cant ...
(''Jura Bernois''). The other is
Schelten.
History
Seehof is first mentioned in 1540 as ''Seehoft''. In 1673 it was mentioned as ''Eslay''. Until 1914 the official name was the French name ''Elay''. By 1880 almost the entire population (97%) of the village was German speaking.
[
For most of its history, the village was part of the lands of the ]provost
Provost may refer to:
Officials
Ecclesiastic
* Provost (religion), a high-ranking church official
* Prince-provost, a high-ranking church official
Government
* Provost (civil), an officer of local government, including the equivalent ...
of Moutier-Grandval
Moutier-Grandval Abbey was a Benedictine abbey near the villages of Moutier and Grandval in today's Bernese Jura, Canton of Bern in Switzerland. It was founded around 640, when Grandval already existed; Moutier grew up around the abbey.
Histor ...
under the Prince-Bishop
A prince-bishop is a bishop who is also the civil ruler of some secular principality and sovereignty, as opposed to '' Prince of the Church'' itself, a title associated with cardinals. Since 1951, the sole extant prince-bishop has been the ...
of Basel
Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...
. During the Protestant Reformation
The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the papacy and ...
in 1528, Seehof/Elay was part of the Sous-les-Roches region that remained by the old faith. After the 1797 French victory and the Treaty of Campo Formio
The Treaty of Campo Formio (today Campoformido) was signed on 17 October 1797 (26 Vendémiaire VI) by Napoleon Bonaparte and Count Philipp von Cobenzl as representatives of the French Republic and the Austrian monarchy, respectively. The trea ...
, Seehof became part of the French Département
In the administrative divisions of France, the department (, ) is one of the three levels of government under the national level (" territorial collectivities"), between the administrative regions and the communes. There are a total of 101 ...
of Mont-Terrible
Mont-Terrible () was a department of the First French Republic, with its seat at Porrentruy.
The Mont Terrible for which the department was named is now known as , a peak of near Courgenay (now in the canton of Jura, Switzerland). The toponym ...
. Three years later, in 1800 it became part of the Département of Haut-Rhin
Haut-Rhin (); Alsatian: ''Owerelsàss'' or '; , . is a department in the Grand Est region, France, bordering both Germany and Switzerland. It is named after the river Rhine; its name means Upper Rhine. Haut-Rhin is the smaller and less pop ...
. After Napoleon
Napoleon Bonaparte (born Napoleone di Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French general and statesman who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led Military career ...
's defeat and the Congress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna of 1814–1815 was a series of international diplomatic meetings to discuss and agree upon a possible new layout of the European political and constitutional order after the downfall of the French Emperor Napoleon, Napol ...
, Seehof was assigned to the Canton of Bern in 1815.[
Today it is part of the Catholic ]parish
A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...
of Vermes
Vermes ("vermin/vermes") is an obsolete taxon used by Carl Linnaeus and Jean-Baptiste Lamarck for non-arthropod invertebrate animals.
Linnaeus
In Linnaeus's ''Systema Naturae'', the Vermes had the rank of class (biology), class, occupying th ...
. The Swiss Reformed
The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), formerly named Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches until 31 December 2019, is a federation of 25 member churches – 24 cantonal churches and the Evangelical-Methodist Church of Switzerland. The PC ...
residents are part of the German speaking parish of Moutier
Moutier () is a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in Switzerland. Currently, the town belongs to the Jura bernois (administrative district), Jura bernois administrative district of the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Bern (canton), Ber ...
or the parish of Grandval.[
A village school is first mentioned in 1784. In 1969, the current school building was built.][
]
Geography
Seehof has an area of . As of 2012, a total of or 33.3% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 63.7% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 2.3% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.6% is either rivers or lakes.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics]
2009 data accessed 25 March 2010
During the same year, housing and buildings made up 1.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.8%. Out of the forested land, 59.7% of the total land area is heavily forested and 4.0% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 1.2% is used for growing crops and 18.7% is pastures and 13.2% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.[
The municipality is located in the Seehof valley. It consists of the village of Seehof and the ]hamlets
A hamlet is a human settlement that is smaller than a town or village. This is often simply an informal description of a smaller settlement or possibly a subdivision or satellite entity to a larger settlement. Sometimes a hamlet is defined f ...
of Bächlen, Karlisberg and Stägen.
On 31 December 2009 District de Moutier, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Arrondissement administratif Jura bernois.[Nomenklaturen – Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz]
accessed 4 April 2011
Coat of arms
The blazon
In heraldry and heraldic vexillology, a blazon is a formal description of a coat of arms, flag or similar emblem, from which the reader can reconstruct an accurate image. The verb ''to blazon'' means to create such a description. The visual d ...
of the municipal coat of arms
A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...
is ''Argent a Cow Gules statant on a Mount of 3 Coupeaux Vert.''
Demographics
Seehof has a population () of . , 2.9% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2001-2011) the population has changed at a rate of 1.4%. Migration accounted for 0%, while births and deaths accounted for 1.4%.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office]
accessed 23 July 2013
Most of the population () speaks German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany, the country of the Germans and German things
**Germania (Roman era)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
(72 or 91.1%) as their first language with the rest speaking French
French may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to France
** French language, which originated in France
** French people, a nation and ethnic group
** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices
Arts and media
* The French (band), ...
.[
, the population was 56.5% male and 43.5% female. The population was made up of 39 Swiss men (56.5% of the population) and (0.0%) non-Swiss men. There were 28 Swiss women (40.6%) and 2 (2.9%) non-Swiss women.][Statistical office of the Canton of Bern]
accessed 4 January 2012 Of the population in the municipality, 35 or about 44.3% were born in Seehof and lived there in 2000. There were 11 or 13.9% who were born in the same canton, while 23 or 29.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 6 or 7.6% were born outside of Switzerland.[
, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 27.1% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 54.3% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 18.6%.][
, there were 42 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 32 married individuals, 4 widows or widowers and 1 individual who was divorced.][STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000]
accessed 2 February 2011
, there were 3 households that consist of only one person and 7 households with five or more people. , a total of 21 apartments (87.5% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 3 apartments (12.5%) were seasonally occupied.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen]
accessed 28 January 2011 The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 3.7%. In 2011, single family homes made up 29.2% of the total housing in the municipality.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
Politics
In the 2011 federal election the most popular party was the Swiss People's Party (SVP) which received 50% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the Federal Democratic Union of Switzerland (EDU) (20.6%), the Green Party
A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as environmentalism and social justice.
Green party platforms typically embrace Social democracy, social democratic economic policies and fo ...
(15.2%) and the Conservative Democratic Party (BDP) (11.4%). In the federal election, a total of 25 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
In political science, voter turnout is the participation rate (often defined as those who cast a ballot) of a given election. This is typically either the percentage of Voter registration, registered voters, Suffrage, eligible voters, or all Voti ...
was 41.0%.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office 2011 Election]
accessed 8 May 2012
Economy
, Seehof had an unemployment rate of 0%. , there were a total of 33 people employed in the municipality. Of these, there were 33 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 14 businesses involved in this sector. No one was employed in the secondary sector
In macroeconomics, the secondary sector of the economy is an economic sector in the three-sector theory that describes the role of manufacturing. It encompasses industries that produce a finished, usable product or are involved in constructi ...
or the tertiary sector
The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector (raw materials) and the ...
.[ There were 34 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 29.4% of the workforce.
there were a total of 25 ]full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent (FTE), or whole time equivalent (WTE), is a unit of measurement that indicates the workload of an employed person (or student) in a way that makes workloads or class loads comparable across various contexts. FTE is often use ...
jobs, of which 23 were in agriculture and 2 were in forestry or lumber production.
, there were 5 workers who commuted into the municipality and 10 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 2.0 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. A total of 24 workers (82.8% of the 29 total workers in the municipality) both lived and worked in Seehof.[Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb]
accessed 24 June 2010
Of the working population, 14.7% used public transportation to get to work, and 17.6% used a private car.[
In 2011 the average local and cantonal tax rate on a married resident, with two children, of Seehof making 150,000 CHF was 12.7%, while an unmarried resident's rate was 18.7%. For comparison, the rate for the entire canton in the same year, was 14.2% and 22.0%, while the nationwide rate was 12.3% and 21.1% respectively. In 2009 there were a total of 25 tax payers in the municipality. Of that total, 2 made over 75,000 CHF per year. The greatest number of workers, 6, made between 20,000 and 30,000 CHF per year. The average income of the over 75,000 CHF group in Seehof was 89,400 CHF, while the average across all of Switzerland was 130,478 CHF. In 2011 a total of 2.9% of the population received direct financial assistance from the government.
]
Religion
From the , 48 or 60.8% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church
The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), formerly named Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches until 31 December 2019, is a federation of 25 member churches – 24 cantonal churches and the Evangelical-Methodist Church of Switzerland. The P ...
, while 5 or 6.3% were Roman Catholic
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...
. Of the rest of the population, there were 12 individuals (or about 15.19% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. 11 (or about 13.92% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. (page 56 in 1967 edition) It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer to ...
or atheist
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
, and 3 individuals (or about 3.80% of the population) did not answer the question.[
]
Education
In Seehof about 55.6% of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education
Secondary education is the education level following primary education and preceding tertiary education.
Level 2 or ''lower secondary education'' (less commonly ''junior secondary education'') is considered the second and final phase of basic e ...
, and 2.8% have completed additional higher education (either university
A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...
or a ''Fachhochschule
A (; plural ), abbreviated FH, is a university of applied sciences (UAS), in other words a Hochschule, German tertiary education institution that provides professional education in many applied sciences and applied arts, such as engineering, te ...
'').[ Of the 2 who had completed some form of tertiary schooling listed in the census, 50.0% were Swiss men, 50.0% were Swiss women.][
The Canton of Bern school system provides one year of non-obligatory ]Kindergarten
Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cen ...
, followed by six years of Primary school. This is followed by three years of obligatory lower Secondary school where the students are separated according to ability and aptitude. Following the lower Secondary students may attend additional schooling or they may enter an apprenticeship
Apprenticeship is a system for training a potential new practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study. Apprenticeships may also enable practitioners to gain a license to practice in a regulat ...
.[Schuljahr 2011/12 pdf document]
accessed 9 May 2013
, there were a total of 13 students attending any school in the municipality. Of those, 13 both lived and attended school in the municipality, while 2 students from Seehof attended schools outside the municipality.[
]
References
{{Authority control
Municipalities of the canton of Bern