SCHWYZ, one of the forest cantons of Switzerland, ranking fifth in the confederation. It extends from the upper end of the Lake of Zurich on the north to the middle reach of the Lake of Lucerne on the south; on the west it touches at Küssnacht the northern arm of the latter lake, and at Arth the Lake of Zug, while on the east it stretches to the ridges at the head of the Muottathal, which divide it from Glarus. Its total area is 350·7 square miles, of which 254·9 are classed as “productive land” (193·3 of this being pasture or arable land) and 95·8 as “unproductive land” (glaciers and lakes occupying 21 square miles). The highest point is the Grieseltstock or Faulen (9200 feet); the summit of the Rigi (Rigi Kulm) is also within its limits. In 1880 the population (nearly equally divided between the two sexes) was 51,235, an increase of 3530 since 1870. The only towns of any size are Einsiedeln (population, 8401) and the capital, Schwyz (6543). German is the mother-tongue of 49,631 of the inhabitants, and there is an Italian colony of 1377. The Roman Catholics number 50,266, the Protestants but 954. Till 1814 the canton formed part of the diocese of Constance; since that time it is practically (though not formally) included in that of Chur. Besides a monastery of Capuchin friars and four nunneries, the canton boasts of the great Benedictine abbey of Einsiedeln, which grew up round the cell of the hermit St Meinrad (d. 863); it received its first charter in 946 from Otho I., and contains a black statue of the Virgin, which attracts about 150,000 pilgrims annually. In Schwyz primary education is free and compulsory, the state also giving grants in aid of secondary instruction. The population are mainly engaged in pastoral occupations, the chief article of ...export (largely to north Italy) being a special breed of cattle, which enjoys a very high reputation in the confederation. The only railways in the canton are the portion of the St Gotthard line between Küssnacht, Immensee, and Sisikon, and the line from Arth to the summit of the Rigi.
The valley of Schwyz first appears in history in 970. Later a community of free men is found settled at the foot of the Mythen, possessing common lands and subject only to the count of the Zurich gau, as the representative of the emperor; from the Hapsburgs Steinen in 1269 and Arth (completely) in 1354 bought their freedom and became part of the free community of Schwyz. The early history of Schwyz consists mainly of struggles with the abbey of Einsiedeln about rights of pasture. In 1240 the inhabitants obtained from Frederick II. the “Reichsfreiheit,” i.e., direct dependence on the emperor, being thus freed from the Hapsburg counts of the Zurich gau. In 1273 the younger branch of the house of Hapsburg sold all its property and rights in the valley to the elder branch, which a few months later obtained the empire, and in April 1291 bought the rights of the Alsatian abbey of Murbach over Lucerne. Schwyz took the lead in making the famous league of 1st August 1291 with the neighbouring districts of Uri and Unterwalden, for which its position and the free spirit of its inhabitants specially fitted it. An attack by Schwyz on Einsiedeln was the excuse for the Austrian invasion which on 15th November 1315 was gloriously beaten back in Morgarten Pass. In the history of the league Schwyz was always to the front, so that its name in a dialectal form (Schweiz) was applied by foreigners from the 14th century onwards to the league as a whole, though it formed part of its formal style only from 1803. Soon after the victory of Sempach (1386) the men of Schwyz began to extend their borders. In 1394 they acquired the town of Einsiedeln (becoming in 1397, and finally in 1434, the “protectors” of the great abbey) and in 1402 Küssnacht, while in 1412-37 they won the “March,” and in 1440 Wollerau and Pfäffikon,—all on or near the Lake of Zurich. All these districts were governed by Schwyz as subjects, not as equals or allies, supreme power resting with the “Landsgemeinde” (or assembly of all citizens of full age) of Schwyz, which is first mentioned in 1294. Schwyz joined the other forest cantons in opposing the Reformation, and took part in the battle of Cappel (1531), in which Zwingli fell. In 1586 it became a member of the Golden or Borromean League, formed to continue the work of Charles Borromeo in carrying out the counter-Reformation. In 1798 Schwyz, including Gersau (free since 1390), formed part of the “Tellgau” or “République Telliane,” set up by the French, which a week later gave way to the “Helvetic republic,” though the free men offered a valiant resistance under Aloys Reding. In 1799 it was the scene of the disastrous retreat from Altdorf to Glarus made over the Kinzigkulm and Pragel Passes by the Russians under Suwaroff in face of the French army. Schwyz steadily resisted all proposals for the revision of the federal constitution of 1815, joined the league of Sarnen in 1832, and, when religious disputes had further complicated matters, the “Sonderbund” (1843 and 1845), which was only put down by the war of November 1847. The constitution of 1848 was revised in 1855, 1876 (when membership of one of the twenty-nine “Gemeinde” or communes became the political qualification), and 1884.
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