Author: Maarten Koning

The Languages of Switzerland

Celts, Romans, Alemanni: the names are familiar in Switzerland. The exhibition  ’Archaeology in Switzerland’ gives an overview of its history. The Celtic tribes spoke the same language and shared the same (religious) culture.

The Romans brought unity in language, law, culture, political system, and economy, a process known as Romanisation nowadays.

However, this unity was rather fragile and collapsed after the Romans’ departure in the fifth century. Frankish rulers reunited the territory and introduced Christianity, along with abbeys, bishoprics, and a centralised administrative system. Charlemagne was their most effective ruler.

One development could not be turned back, however: the linguistic variety of Switzerland, the result of the Roman and Romansh heritage, the French-speaking kingdoms of Burgundy in the west, the Frankish rule, the arrival of the German-speaking Alemanni in the centre, north and east of the country, the migration of the German-speaking Walser in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries and the Italian languages in the south of the country.

(Further information: www.nationalmuseum.ch).

Tadeusz Kosciuszko in Switzerland

Tadeusz Kosciuszko was born in 1746, in a town now part of the Republic of Belarus, to a Polish aristocratic family.

He pursued a career as an army officer, first in Warsaw (1765-1769) and subsequently in France (1769-1774), where he acquired expertise as a military engineer in building military fortifications. He was abroad during the First Partition of Poland in 1772.

He moved to America to volunteer in the American Revolution against England to escape his occupied country. The United States Congress appointed him a colonel in the United States Army Corps of Engineers.

Kosciuszko built eight fortifications, and for his merits, he was promoted to Brigadier General and received estates near West Point, as well as an annuity. However, Kosciuszko didn’t stay in America; he returned in 1784 to his estate in Poland.

During the second (1792) and third (1795) uprisings and partitions of Poland, he earned his fame as a Polish national hero. The King, Stanislaw August Poniatowski (1732-1798), whose secretary was Maurice Glayre (1743-1819), a Swiss from the canton of Waadt, wanted to turn Poland into a modern state.

Inspired by the experiences of the American and French Revolutions, he attempted to implement similar reforms in Poland.

Russian armies invaded the Polish kingdom and crushed the reform movement. Kosciuszko emigrated to Saxony and France, where the Legislative Assembly gave him honorary citizenship. Russia and Prussia then effected the 2nd partition of Poland.

In September 1793, Kosciuszko became the Supreme Commander of the Polish liberation army. He was beaten in November 1794 after initial victories. In January  1795, the three invaders (Russia, Prussia and Austria) divided the country.

On December 19, 1796, he travelled through Sweden and England, arriving in Philadelphia in mid-August 1797.

Upon hearing the news of the formation of the Polish Legions in Italy, Kosciuszko travelled to France in 1798, where he fought alongside the French Legions in Italy and along the Rhine to achieve his primary objective: the liberation of Poland.

Napoleon had other objectives, such as creating the Duchy of Warsaw, linked by a personal union with the Kingdom of Saxony. Kosciuszko returned to Paris, where he met Peter Joseph Zeltner, a Swiss Member of Parliament from Solothurn.

Poland was prey for Russia, Prussia, and Austria after Napoleon and his Empire had fallen. The country’s fate was sealed at the Congress of Vienna in 1815.

Kosciuszko settled in Solothurn, where he died on October 15, 1817. He was buried in Zuchwil, near Solothurn. His remains were buried in Krakow in 1818, but his heart was later transferred to the Polish National Museum in Warsaw in 1927.

The Swiss Kosciuszko Society is named after this unconventional aristocrat, who is still being commemorated in the United States, Poland and Switzerland.

A national commemoration plate in Philadelphia, the Kosciuszko Bridge in New York, Kosciuszko municipalities in Indiana and Mississippi, Kosciuszko Island in Alaska, the Kosciuszko Mountain in Australia, Kosciuszko stars in the cosmos, the Kosciuszko Hill in Krakow and the Kosciuszko Museum and Society in Solothurn

(Source: www.kosciuszkomuseum.ch).

Association pro Büvetta in Scuol-Tarasp

The mineral water trail (Mineralwasserweg Scuol in German or senda d’aua minerala Scuol in Romansh) consists of hiking trails in the area of Scuol, Tarasp, Ftan and Sent in Lower Engadine (Unterengadin, canton Graubünden). Information is provided in two languages (Romansh and German.

More than twenty springs bubble from the rocks in Tarasp and Scuol (canton Graubünden). The development of tourism began in 1841. Two entrepreneurs leased the springs of Tarasp and built a park.

The Kurhaus

The Büvetta drinking hall (Trinkhalle) was built around 1843. The Kurhaus was completed in 1864. The drinking hall, which had shops, salons, large vaulted windows, and a rotunda with columns on high marble pedestals, was completed in 1876.

Bathing and drinking cures are among the oldest forms of healing. The Romans were enthusiastic bathers and built many therms in what is now Switzerland for healing, pleasure and hygiene. Roman Aquae Helveticae (nowadays Baden, canton of Argovie/Aargau) has the oldest resort in the country.

Hotel Val Sinestra

However, the area around Scuol-Tarasp (canton of Graubünden/Grisons) has the  best mineral water sources.

Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, better known as Paracelsus (1493-1541), already mentioned these springs in 1533, and the physician Conrad Gessner (1516-1565) was among the scientific visitors.

The development of tourism began in 1841 with the construction of the Kurhaus. In 1864, the hotel was completed and ready for use, accommodating 300 guests.

Steam pumps lead the healing water directly to the baths of the Kurhaus. The (international) success of the Kurhaus prompted the plan to build a representative drinking hall, the Büvetta.

In 1876, the architect Bernhard Simon (1816-1900) built an elongated hall with large arched windows and an octagonal roundabout with columns and a high marble plinth.

This architecture bears witness to the splendour of the heyday of spa tourism in the Engadine with the more than 20 highly mineralised springs of Ftan, Tarasp, Scuol and Sent.

With the outbreak of the Second World War, the guests stayed away. After that, the world changed, and the health resort went out of fashion; the decline was unstoppable.

For years, the Büvetta stood empty, but the Verein pro Büvetta looks to the future with the planned World Water Centre, exhibitions and new bathing culture. (Further information: www.pro-büvetta-tarasp.ch).

(Source: Verein pro Büvetta, Tarasp, 2015).

The Queen in Switzerland

The year 2018 marks the 150th anniversary of Queen Victoria’s (1819-1901) visit to Switzerland. The Queen spent five weeks in the country from August 7 to September 9, 1868.

The queen withdrew from public life after the death of her husband, Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1819-1861). She embarked on this journey in memory of her late husband, who had been enthusiastic about Switzerland.

It made a significant contribution to her recovery. Although she travelled with a small court and incognito, half of Europe was aware of the trip. She visited Lucerne and its surrounding destinations, including the Rigi and Pilatus. The highlight was the three-day excursion to the Furka Pass and the Rhone Glacier.

She kept a diary and recorded her impressions in watercolours. The journey of the most powerful woman in the world was the beginning of the boom of the (British) tourist industry in Central Switzerland.

International Rhine Regulation and Rhesi in Widnau

The Rhine from the confluence of the Anterior Rhine (Vorderrhein) and Posterior Rhine (Hinterrhein) rivers near Reichenau in Tamins  (Grisons) to its confluence with Lake Constance is known as the Alpine Rhine or the longest torrent in Europe.

The most devastating flood occurred in 1817. Other floods are recorded in 1888, 1927, 1954, and 1987, and, of course, the Magdalena flood of 1342.

Austria and Switzerland signed in 1892 the International Regulation of the Rhine (IRR). In 2017, the IRR celebrated its 125th anniversary. The Rhy-Schopf of the Werkhof Widnau organises an exhibition about the future of flood protection and the Rhesi-project.

Rhesi stands for Rhine – Recreation and Safety (Rhein – Erholung Sicherheit) in the lower Rhine valley.

(Source and further information: www.rhesi.ch).

Dada and Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich 1916-2016

The first recorded session of Dada took place on 5 February 1916 at the Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich, featuring Hugo Ball, Emmy Hennings, Marcel Janco, Tristan Tzara, and Jean Arp. Dada was a central movement in 20th-century art.

Its spirit developed in the cosmopolitan atmosphere of Zurich, a city of many artists, during the First World War (1914-1918).

Cabaret Voltaire, Spiegelgasse 1

The pacifist attitude was an important starting point. At the same time, the horrors of war challenged artistic conventions.

Civil culture and its canon of values became the target of artistic protest. Instead, the Dadaists sought new forms of expression in the performing and visual arts.

Artists recited poetry, sang and danced at the legendary soirées at the Cabaret Voltaire. Dada revolutionised the art world.

(Source and further information: Cabaret Voltaire; www.arpmuseum.org)