Confoederatio Helvetica 1291 - 1991, Coin Set from Switzerland - detailed information

This set contains two coins commemorating the 700th Anniversary of the Swiss Confederation.

The Old Swiss Confederacy began as a late medieval alliance between the communities of the valleys in the Central Alps, at the time part of the Holy Roman Empire, to facilitate the management of common interests such as free trade and to ensure the peace along the important trade routes through the mountains. The Hohenstaufen emperors had granted these valleys reichsfrei status in the early 13th century. As reichsfrei regions, the cantons (or regions) of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden were under the direct authority of the emperor without any intermediate liege lords and thus were largely autonomous.

With the rise of the Habsburg dynasty, the kings and dukes of Habsburg sought to extend their influence over this region and to bring it under their rule; as a consequence, a conflict ensued between the Habsburgs and these mountain communities who tried to defend their privileged status as reichsfrei regions. The three founding cantons of the Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft, as the confederacy was called, were joined in the early 14th century by the city states of Lucerne, Zürich, and Bern.

The Federal Charter of 1291 is one of the oldest surviving written documents of an alliance between Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden, the founding cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy. It is possible that it was written a few decades later than the given date of 1291, which would put it in the same date range as the pact of Brunnen of 1315. The traditional date given for the foundation of the Swiss Confederacy in Swiss historiography of the 16th century (Aegidius Tschudi and others) is 1307.