Swiss peasant war of 1653
Swiss peasant war of 1653 | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Peasant forces (from Lucerne, Bern, Solothurn, Basel, and the Aargau) |
City governments' troops, Zürich, with soldiers from the Thurgau, Uri | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Niklaus Leuenberger, Christian Schybi, and others |
Sigmund von Erlach, Sebastian Peregrin Zwyer |
The Swiss peasant war of 1653 (
The population of the countryside demanded fiscal relief from their ruling authorities, the city councils of these cantons' capitals. When their demands were dismissed by the cities, the peasants organized themselves and threatened to blockade the cities. After initial compromises mediated by other cantons had failed, the peasants united under the treaty of Huttwil, forming the "League of Huttwil". Their movement became more radical, going beyond the initially purely fiscal demands. The Huttwil League considered itself a political entity equal to and independent from the city authorities, and it assumed full military and political sovereignty in its territories.
The peasants laid siege to Bern and Lucerne, whereupon the cities negotiated a peace agreement with the peasant leader Niklaus Leuenberger, the so-called peace on the Murifeld. The peasant armies retreated. The Tagsatzung, the federal council of the Old Swiss Confederacy, then sent an army from Zürich to definitively end the rebellion, and after the Battle of Wohlenschwil, the Huttwil League was forcibly disbanded in the peace of Mellingen. The last resistance in the Entlebuch valley was broken by the end of June. After their victory, the city authorities took drastic punitive measures. The Huttwil League and the peace of the Murifeld were declared null and void by the city council of Bern. Many leaders of the insurrection were captured, tortured, and finally received heavy sentences. Niklaus Leuenberger was beheaded and quartered in Bern on September 6, 1653.[a]
Although the military victory of the
Background
The Old Swiss Confederacy in the 17th century was a federation of thirteen largely independent
Rural and urban cantons had the same standing in the federation. Each canton was sovereign within its territory, pursuing its own foreign policy and also minting its own money. The diet and central council of the federation, the Tagsatzung, held no real power and served more as an instrument of coordination. The reformation in the early 16th century had led to a confessional division amongst the cantons: the central Swiss cantons including Lucerne had remained Catholic, while Zürich, Bern, Basel, Schaffhausen, and also the city of St. Gallen had become Protestant. The Tagsatzung was often paralysed by disagreements between the equally strong factions of the Catholic and Protestant sides.[3]
Territories that had been conquered since the early 15th century were governed as
Causes of the conflict
At its root, the peasant war of 1653 was caused by the rapidly changing economic circumstances after the end of the
At the same time the war had since the 1620s caused significant expenses for the cities, e.g. for building better defenses such as new
Since the 15th century, the political power in the city cantons had become more and more concentrated in the hands of a few urban families, who increasingly saw their public offices as hereditary positions and who developed aristocratic and absolutist attitudes. Slowly, an urban oligarchy of magistrates had formed. This concentration of power in the city cantons in a small urban élite caused a veritable "participatory crisis" (Suter). The rural population increasingly was subject to decrees issued without their consent that restricted their rights of old and also their social and cultural freedom.[10][11]
Outbreak of the rebellion
At the beginning of December 1652, Bern devalued its copper Batzen by 50% to adjust its face value to its intrinsic value to combat the inflation. The authorities set a term of only three days to exchange the copper coins at the old rate against more stable gold or silver money. Not many people could thus take advantage of this exchange offer, and for most—and in particular the rural population—half their fortunes just vanished. The other cantons soon followed suit and similarly devalued the Bernese copper money. The situation was most dire in the Lucerne Entlebuch valley, where the Bernese Batzen were in widespread usage. The financial situation of many a peasant became unsustainable.[11] Insider deals of the ruling magistrates of Lucerne furthered the unrest among the population.[12][13] The peasants of the Entlebuch valley, led by Hans Emmenegger from Schüpfheim and Christian Schybi from Escholzmatt, sent a delegation to Lucerne to demand remedies, but the city council refused to even hear them. The enraged peasants organized a general assembly (Landsgemeinde) of the population of the valley at Heiligkreuz, in spite of such assemblies being illegal as the authorities' laws of the time denied the freedom of assembly.[14] The assembly, which took place after the mass on February 10, 1653, decided to suspend all tax payments until the authorities in Lucerne fulfilled their demands by reducing taxes and abolishing some of them altogether, such as the taxes on salt, cattle, and horse trades.[15][16]
The authorities of Lucerne were not willing to grant the population's demands, but neither did they manage to subdue this insurrection.[17][18] The large majority of the rural districts of the canton of Lucerne sided with the peasants of the Entlebuch valley in an alliance concluded at Wolhusen on February 26, 1653. At the beginning of March, the people of the neighbouring Bernese Emmental valley joined their cause, addressing similar demands at the Bernese authorities. Both cantons called upon the other uninvolved members of the Old Swiss Confederacy to mediate in the conflict, but at the same time, the Tagsatzung, the diet of the cantons' governments, also began to prepare for a military resolution. Troops from Schaffhausen and Basel were sent towards the Aargau, but this immediately solicited an armed resistance amongst the population such that the troops had to withdraw.[19]
On March 18, 1653, the mediating Catholic central Swiss cantons proposed in Lucerne a resolution that fulfilled most of the peasants' demands, especially the fiscal ones.
Formation of the Huttwil League
The negotiations between the city authorities and the peasants were not continued. While the authorities debated at the Tagsatzung how to deal with the insurrection, the peasants worked to gain support for their cause amongst the rural population of other regions and lobbied for a formal alliance. A peasant delegation sent to Zürich was turned back promptly: the city authorities, who had put down local unrests in their territory already in 1645 and again in 1646, had already recognized the danger of the agitation.[24] On April 23, 1653, representatives of the people of the countryside of Lucerne, Bern, Basel, and Solothurn met at Sumiswald and concluded an alliance to help each other to achieve their goals. A week later, they met again at Huttwil, where they renewed that alliance and elected Niklaus Leuenberger from Rüderswil in the Emmental as their leader.[25]
On May 14, 1653, the peasants met again at a Landsgemeinde at Huttwil and formalized their alliance as the "League of Huttwil" by signing a written contract in the style of the old
The peasants by then had assumed full sovereignty over the territory they controlled. They refused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the city authorities and also had the military control over the area. The Huttwil League openly declared its intention to expand until it encompassed the rural population in the whole Confederacy.[27] The majority of the rural population supported the rebellion; the dissenting minority was silenced by threats of violence and sometimes violence indeed.[28] Communications between the cities were interrupted, official envoys were shaken down and ships on the rivers were captured. The peasants even sent a letter to the French ambassador at Solothurn assuring the French king Louis XIV of their good intentions.[25]
The confessional conflicts that dominated the relations between the ruling city authorities were only secondary to the peasants of the Huttwil league. The peasant alliance bridged the confessional divide, uniting Catholic people from the Entlebuch and from Solothurn with Protestant peasants from the Emmental and from Basel. The treaty of Huttwil explicitly recognized this biconfessionalism.[29] The cities remained in all their manoeuvring and negotiations for military support within their respective confessional spheres: Catholic Lucerne had requested mediation and then military help from the Catholic central Swiss cantons, while Protestant Bern had turned to Protestant Zürich for help. The distrust between the authorities of the Catholic and Protestant cantons was so deep that none would allow troops of the other confession to operate on their territories.[30]
Military confrontation
Both sides began to prepare openly for an armed conflict. The cities faced the problem that their armies were militias, recruited from the rural population of their subject territories, but that precisely this rural population had turned against them. Bern began raising troops in the Vaud and the Bernese Oberland, two regions unaffected by the uprising. The authorities of Bern and Lucerne were supported by the other cantons at the Tagsatzung.[31] In a dispatch from Zürich, the uprising was termed for the first time a "revolution".[d]
On May 18, 1653, the peasants delivered ultimatums to Bern and Lucerne and raised 16,000 troops.[32] When the city of Bern replied with a protest note, the peasants marched to Bern under the leadership of Leuenberger, arriving on May 22, 1653. A second army led by Emmenegger laid siege to Lucerne. The city authorities were unprepared for an armed conflict and immediately engaged in negotiations. Within days, peace agreements were concluded. In the peace on the Murifeld (Murifeldfrieden, named after the field just outside Bern where the peasant army's camp lay) signed by Leuenberger and the mayor of Bern, Niklaus Dachselhofer, the city council of Bern promised on May 28, 1653, to fulfill the peasants' fiscal demands in return for the dissolution of the Huttwil League. In view of this development, the city of Lucerne and the besieging peasants agreed on a truce. Leuenberger's army lifted the siege of Bern and retreated, but the people refused to follow their leaders and objected to dissolving the Huttwil League.[33]
On May 30, 1653, following an earlier resolution of the Tagsatzung and earlier Bernese demands, Zürich assembled an army with recruits from its own territories, from the
Bernese troops under the command of
The Entlebuch valley, where the revolt had begun, resisted a little longer. Peasant troops under the command of Schybi tried in vain on June 5, 1653, to gain the bridge at Gisikon, held by a joint army of the city of Lucerne and the central Swiss cantons commanded by Sebastian Peregrin Zwyer of Uri. In the following weeks, Zwyer's troops slowly advanced through the valley, until they controlled it completely by June 20, 1653. Schybi was captured a few days later and incarcerated at Sursee.[42]
Aftermath
The city authorities proceeded to punish severely the leaders of the Huttwil League. Bern did not accept the terms of the peace of Melligen with its amnesty, claiming the treaty was invalid on its territory, and cracked down hard on the rural population. The peasants were fined large sums and were made to cover the expenses for the military operations.[43] The peace of the Murifeld was declared null and void by the Bernese city council, as was the Huttwil League.[44] The rural population was disarmed. Many of the exponents of the movement were incarcerated, tortured, and finally sentenced to death or to hard labour on galleys, or exiled.[43][45] Christian Schybi was executed at Sursee on July 9, 1653.[41] Niklaus Leuenberger was beheaded and quartered at Bern on September 6, 1653; his head was nailed at the gallows together with one of the four copies of the Bundesbrief of the Huttwil League.[46] Punishment was hardest in the canton of Bern, where 23 death sentences were handed down and numerous other prominent peasants were executed in courts-martial by von Erlach's army,[47] compared to eight and seven death sentences in Lucerne and Basel, respectively.[48]
Although the authorities had won a total military victory, they refrained from inflicting further draconian measures on the general population. The whole affair had clearly demonstrated that the cities depended on the support of their rural subjects. Putting down the insurrection had been achieved only with difficulties, and only with the help of troops from Zürich and Uri. Had the peasants succeeded to extend the Huttwil League to encompass the countryside of Zürich, the outcome of the conflict might have been different.[49] The city authorities were well aware of their essentially lucky escape, and their actions in the following years reflect it.[50] While they took steps to disempower the rural population politically, they also fulfilled many of the peasants original fiscal demands, alleviating the economic pressure on them. Tax reforms were passed, to the point that for instance in the canton of Lucerne the overall taxation of the population decreased in the second half of the 17th century.[51]
Suter even concludes that the peasant war of 1653 thwarted a further advancement of
Historiography
In the decades following the peasant war the city authorities tried to suppress the memory of this nearly successful revolt. Resistance symbols like the flags or the weapons used by the peasants, in particular their typical
In the 19th century, the official view was increasingly questioned. The aristocratic
The official view remained ambivalent at best, though. A scene devoted to the peasant war of 1653 in a theatre production for the Swiss
Ideological instrumentalizations of the peasant war occurred even in the 20th century. Hans Mühlestein, a Swiss
Modern historians generally agree that the peasant war was an important event in Swiss history, and also in comparison to other
- The revolt spread quickly to cover several cantons, whereas previous uprisings in the Confederacy had invariably been local affairs.
- The peasants were well organized and for the only time mobilized veritable armies against their rulers, which hadn't happened before. The peasant leaders had clearly learned from previous unsuccessful smaller revolts they had been involved in.
- The peasants' goals for the first time went beyond a pure restoration of rights of old and tax relief: the Huttwil League radically denied the authorities' hitherto unquestioned entitlement to rule.[1][6][69]
In 2003, the city of Bern celebrated the 650th anniversary of its adherence to the Old Swiss Confederacy with many events, including a dedicated exposition at the Historical Museum that ran for several months and the publication of the history schoolbook Berns mutige Zeit.[70] The simultaneous 350-year anniversary of the peasant war was reflected in the city only in a few newspaper articles, but it was widely celebrated in the countryside[71] with speeches, colloquia, and an ambitious and very successful open-air theatre production at Eggiwil in the Emmental.[72]
Footnotes
- a All dates are given according to the Gregorian calendar, which was already in effect in all the Catholic cantons. The Protestant cantons still followed the Julian calendar at that time.[73]
- low justice, and thus to a large extent "free" in the medieval sense of the word.[74]
- Gresham's Law.
- d Incidentally, this note appears to be the first documented use of the word "revolution" with the modern meaning in the sense of a political revolution without any connotation of a circular movement.[75][76]
- e Because of his connections—he had married into the influential Bernese von Graffenried family—Samuel Tribolet was allowed to return from exile after only two years in late 1655 and again served on the city council of Bern.[54]
- f The statue of Leuenberger at Rüderswil was donated by the Ökonomische Gesellschaft Bern,[77] a society that was founded in 1759 and originally composed of members of the leading families of the city of Bern.[78]
Notes
- ^ a b Suter (1997) is the main source used.
- ^ See generally Im Hof 1974/2001.
- ^ Holenstein (HDS 2005)
- ^ Wohler (HDS 2005)
- ^ a b Suter (HDS 2002)
- ^ a b c Holenstein 2004, p. 33.
- ^ Suter 1997, p. 363ff.
- ^ a b Suter 2004, p. 146.
- ^ Suter 1997, pp. 382, 390.
- ^ a b Holenstein 2004, p. 34f.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 147.
- ^ a b c Messmer 2003.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, p. 35ff.
- ^ Suter 1997, p. 122f.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 21.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, p. 37.
- ^ State Archive of Lucerne: Bauernkrieg 1653
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 39f.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 28.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 37.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 39.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, p. 38f.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 43.
- ^ a b Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 44.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, pp. 39ff, 49.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, p. 40.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 45.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, p. 47.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 151.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 46.
- ^ Bonjour, Edgar, et al. A Short History of Switzerland (Oxford, 1952) p. 194
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, pp. 49–56.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 57.
- ^ Wahlen 1952, p. 69.
- ^ Wahlen 1952, p. 104.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 59.
- ^ Wahlen 1952, p. 72.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 62.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, pp. 66f.
- ^ a b Wahlen 1952, p. 105.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 69.
- ^ a b Holenstein 2004, p. 51.
- ^ a b Suter 2004, pp. 154f.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 162.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 374.
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 68.
- ^ Landolt 2004.
- ^ Suter 2004, pp. 148, 151f.
- ^ a b Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 73.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 153.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 150ff.
- ^ Suter 1997, p. 404.
- ^ a b Hostettler 2003.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 152.
- ^ Stanyan 1714.
- ^ Wirz et al.
- ^ Wirz 1653.
- ^ a b c Suter 2004, p. 155.
- ^ University library of Lucerne: Handschriften, Drucke und Bilder zum Bauernkrieg 1653 Archived October 23, 2004, at the Wayback Machine; in German. URL last accessed August 17, 2006.
- ^ Holenstein 2004.
- ^ Suter 1997, pp. 55f.
- ^ JHolenstein 2004, p. 53.
- ^ Suter 2004, p. 156.
- ^ Römer 2004, p. 12.
- ^ Suter 1997, pp. 53.
- ^ Römer 2004, p. 13f.
- ^ Mühlestein 1942.
- ^ Holenstein 2004, p. 52.
- ISBN 3-7272-1272-1. In German.
- ^ Muster.
- ^ Hostettler (2003–2)
- ^ Stüssi-Lauterburg 2003, p. 20.
- ^ Wohler (HDS 2005): Free Districts.
- ^ Suter 1997, p. 13.
- ^ Römer, J. (2004–2).
- ^ Römer 2004, p. 23.
- ^ Holenstein, A.; Pfister, Ch.; Stuber, M.: Die Oekonomische Gesellschaft Bern (OeG) 1759–1890 Archived July 7, 2011, at the Wayback Machine; research project 2003–2009 of the University of Bern. In German. URL last accessed November 22, 2006.
References
- Holenstein, A. (2004): Der Bauernkrieg von 1653. Ursachen, Verlauf und Folgen einer gescheiterten Revolution; pp. 28 – 65 in: Römer, J. (ed.): Bauern, Untertanen und "Rebellen", Orell Füssli Verlag, Zürich, 2004. ISBN 3-280-06020-6. An earlier, abridged version appeared under the same title Archived July 6, 2011, at the Wayback Machinein Berner Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Heimatkunde, no. 66, pp. 1 – 43; 2004. (In German.)
- Holenstein, A. (HDS 2005): Condominiums in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, September 6, 2005. URL last accessed November 20, 2006.
- Hostettler, U. (2003): "Mach Mist, derweil Du Landvogt bist" – Die Gnädigen Herren – Samuel Tribolet, Berner Zeitung, April 19, 2003. In German. URL last accessed January 24, 2010.
- Hostettler, U. (2003–2): Stationentheater Eggiwil: Bauernkrieg 1653 – Skript. Script of a Swiss theatre production in 2003, including background information on the history. In German. URL last accessed January 24, 2010.
- Im Hof, U.: Geschichte der Schweiz, 7th ed., Stuttgart: ISBN 3-17-017051-1. In German.
- Landolt, N. (2004): Revolte oder Krieg? Regional unterschiedliche Ausprägungen des Bauernkrieges 1653, pp. 87 –104 in Römer, J. (ed.): Bauern, Untertanen und "Rebellen", Orell Füssli Verlag, Zürich, 2004. ISBN 3-280-06020-6.
- Messmer, K. (2003): Die Entlebucher – der Ursprung alles Übels, Canton of Lucerne, Dept. of Justice and Culture, in collaboration with the newspaper Neue Luzerner Zeitung, March 15, 2003. In German. URL last accessed August 18, 2006.
- Mühlestein, H. (1942): Der grosse schweizerische Bauernkrieg, self-published, Celerina, 1942. Reprinted 1977, Unionsverlag, Zürich; ISBN 3-293-00003-7. For a gist of this Marxist interpretation, see Vorwärts: Der schweizerische Bauernkrieg 1653 Archived December 14, 2006, at the Wayback Machine. URL last accessed August 17, 2006.
- Muster, E.: Texte und Bilder zum Grossen Schweizerischen Bauernkrieg von 1653 ("Texts and images on the great Swiss peasant war of 1653"); in German. URL last accessed November 21, 2006.
- Römer, J. (2004): 1653: Geschichte, Geschichtsschreibung und Erinnerung, pp. 8 – 27 in Römer, J. (ed.): Bauern, Untertanen und "Rebellen", Orell Füssli Verlag, Zürich, 2004. ISBN 3-280-06020-6.
- Stanyan, A. (1714): An account of Switzerland, published by Jacob Tonson, London, 1714.
- Römer, J. (2004–2): Der Bauernkrieg als Revolution und die Revolution als Bauernkrieg, pp. 131 – 142 in Römer, J. (ed.): Bauern, Untertanen und "Rebellen", Orell Füssli Verlag, Zürich, 2004. ISBN 3-280-06020-6.
- State Archive of Lucerne: Bauernkrieg 1653: Forderungen von Stadt und Amt Willisau an die städtische Obrigkeit, 21. Februar 1653 Archived July 6, 2011, at the Wayback Machine, facsimiles and transcriptions of original documents; in German. URL last accessed August 17, 2006.
- Stüssi-Lauterburg, J.; Luginbühl, H.; Gasser, A.; Greminger, A. (2003): Verachtet Herrenpossen! Verschüchet fremde Gäst!, Verlag Merker im Effingerhof, Lenzburg; 2003. ISBN 3-85648-124-9.
- Suter, A. (1997): Der Schweizerische Bauernkrieg von 1653. Politische Sozialgeschichte – Sozialgeschichte eines politischen Ereignisses, Frühneuzeitforschungen Vol. 3; Biblioteca Academica Verlag, Tübingen, 1997. ISBN 3-928471-13-9.
- Suter, A. (HDS 2002): Bauernkrieg (1653) in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, May 14, 2002. URL last accessed August 16, 2006.
- Suter, A. (2004): Kollektive Erinnerungen an historische Ereignisse – Chancen und Gefahren. Der Bauernkrieg als Beispiel, pp. 143 – 163 in Römer, J. (ed.): Bauern, Untertanen und "Rebellen", Orell Füssli Verlag, Zürich, 2004. ISBN 3-280-06020-6.
- Wahlen, H.; Jaggi, E. (1952): Der schweizerische Bauernkrieg 1653 und die seitherige Entwicklung des Bauernstandes, Buchverlag Verbandsdruckerei, Bern, 1952. Published on the occasion of the tricentennial of the peasant war. No ISBN. In German.
- Wirz, H.K. (1653): Ohnpartheyliche substantzliche Beschreibung, der Eydtgnössischen Unruhen, im Jahre Christi 1653 Archived July 3, 2007, at the Wayback Machine ("Impartial description of the uprisings in Switzerland in the year of the Lord 1653"), Zürich, 1653. University library of Lucerne. URL last accessed August 17, 2006.
- Wirz, H.K., Basler, J., Gloggner, J.B. et al.: [Untitled] Darstellungen und Dokumente zum Bauernkrieg 1653 Archived January 18, 2005, at the Wayback Machine, late 17th or early 18th century. University library of Lucerne. URL last accessed August 17, 2006.
- Wohler, A. (HDS 2005): Free Districts – Under Confederate Rule in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, March 31, 2005. URL last accessed November 20, 2006.
- Wohler, A. (HDS 2005): Free Districts in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, March 31, 2005. URL last accessed November 20, 2006.
- Würgler, A. (HDS 2001): Tagsatzung: Anfänge und Entwicklung bis 1798 in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, March 1, 2001. URL last accessed February 19, 2007.
Further reading
- Blickle, P.: Deutsche Untertanen, Ch. Beck Verlag, Munich, 1981. In German. ISBN 3-406-08164-9.