First War of Villmergen, 1712




In German referred to as Zweiter Villmerger Krieg or Toggenburger Krieg (War of Toggenburg).
The two wars of Kappel 1529 and 1531 had resulted in a Swiss agreement, confirmed by the Treaty of Villmergen, signed after the First War of Villmergen 1656, which recognized the confession as a matter of the respective Canton. While Catholic minorities in protestant cantons were granted toleration, no such protection was foreseen for protestant minorities in Catholic cantons. Most of all, the Catholic cantons dominated in the territories under common rule.
When the protestant inhabitants of the County of Toggenburg rebelled against their lord, the Catholic Abbot of St. Gallen, Switzerland's Catholic cantons sided with the abbot, the Reformed cantons with the Toggenburgers. Both sided took up arms; first attempts to negotiate a solution failed. Again the decisive battle was fought at Villmergen; this time, the artillery used by the protestants decided the battle.
The Catholic Cantons lost their dominating position in the administration of the territories under common rule. The Treaty of Baden 1718 guaranteed freedom of religion for the inhabitants of the land of Toggenburg.


EXTERNAL
FILES 		Villmerger Kriege, from Hintergrund und Aktuelles, in German
Toggenburg, from encyclopedia.com
Geschichte des Kantons Sankt Gallen (History of the Canton of St. Gallen), from Schweizer Familienforschung auf dem Internet, in German
DOCUMENTS
REFERENCE



This page is part of World History at KMLA
First posted on February 27th 2004, last revised on November 19th 2004

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