500 years Literary Romansh texts

12 January 2026

In 2027, the Romansh language will celebrate 500 years since the first literary Romansh text was written. The Zuoz lawyer, politician and diplomat Gian Travers (1483-1563) wrote the ‘Chianzun dalla guerra dagl Chiastè da Müs’ in 1527.

The anniversary will be celebrated with an open-air play, themed walks in the Romansh-speaking valleys and events in Swiss cities outside the Romansh-speaking region.

The festivities will culminate in the Travers Romanic Theatre Festival in Zuoz. The municipality of Zuoz and Lia Rumantscha are jointly organising the anniversary events.

To promote contemporary Romanic theatre, the municipality of Zuoz, Lia Rumantscha and the Lyceum Alpinum Zuoz have initiated the Premi Travers Zuoz Romanic Theatre Prize and the Travers Zuoz Festival.

To this end, the three founding institutions established the Uniun Travers association in 2022. It will organise the anniversary festival in Zuoz in the summer of 2027.

In addition to the open-air play, the festival will include the stage production of the play awarded the Premi Travers Zuoz 2026 and other cultural events. The Premi Travers 2026 has already been announced.

A Romansh monologue is being sought. A play concept and an excerpt from the text can be submitted until 15 May 2026. All information is published on the Uniun Travers website.

In summer 2027, the open-air play ‘Il battibuogl’ (The Confusion) will be performed at Plaz Zuoz. The festival will take place from 28 July to 15 August 2027.

The Romansh language on the move

The anniversary celebrations will begin in June 2027 with the opening ceremony in Trun. Lia Rumantscha invites you to a day of music and initial thematic tastings around the written form of the Romansh language. The 500 years of written language will be heralded with a new composition for a children’s choir.

After the opening, several thematic walks will take place in the Romansh-speaking regions, as well as a number of events outside the Romansh-speaking area. The walks and events are each dedicated to a different aspect of the written Romansh language.

The festival, organised by the municipality of Zuoz and Lia Rumantscha, begins in Surselva, travels through Graubünden and Switzerland, and then returns to Zuoz.

(Source and further information: Lia Rumanscha)