History of the villages of the canton of Fribourg

History of the canton of Fribourg

From prehistory to the Romans

The oldest known site in the canton is a Magdalenian camp near the Lac de Lussy, at Châtel-Saint-Denis, dated to about 13'500 BC. Lakeside villages were later built on the shores of the lakes of Neuchâtel and Morat, at Delley, Portalban, Gletterens, Montilier and Greng. At the end of the Iron Age, Mont Vully carried a fortified site that may be one of the twelve oppida mentioned by Caesar.

In Roman times the area depended on Aventicum (Avenches), the capital of the Helvetii. Marsens-Riaz is the only known vicus, and about a hundred villae have been recorded. At Vallon a mosaic from the early 3rd century depicts a venatio, an arena hunt.

The town of the Zähringen

In 1157 Berthold IV of Zähringen founded the town of Fribourg in a bend of the Sarine. After the Zähringen line died out in 1218, the town passed to the Kyburg, who confirmed its charter of liberties, the Handfeste, in 1249. It was bought by the Habsburgs in 1277 and placed itself under Savoy in 1452.

On 22 June 1476 Fribourg won the battle of Morat together with Bern. In 1481 the Covenant of Stans brought Fribourg into the Confederation, without the same rights as the old cantons.

Bailiwicks, Counter-Reformation and patricians

In 1536 Fribourg and Bern conquered the Pays de Vaud. In 1555 the division of the county of Gruyère gave it the land from Montbovon to La Tour-de-Trême. In the 18th century the canton had 19 bailiwicks.

In 1524 the government imposed the Catholic profession of faith on the whole population. The Jesuits founded the Collège Saint-Michel in 1582 under the direction of Peter Canisius, and the Capuchins arrived in 1608. Patrician rule was institutionalised in 1627, and in 1684 power was reserved for 77 so-called ruling families.

From 1798 to the present

On 2 March 1798 the town surrendered to the French troops. In November 1847, after the defeat of the Sonderbund, the Radicals took power and federal troops occupied Fribourg. They lost the elections of December 1856. The railway arrived via Romont in 1862, in 1877 Paul-Alcide Blancpain took over the brewery that became Cardinal, and the Catholic university was established in Fribourg in 1889.

Since 1991 the French and German versions of official texts have had equal force. In 2022, 69.2% of inhabitants had French as their main language and 25.2% German. Mergers reduced the number of communes from 245 to 121 by the threshold of 2025. The canton had 99'891 inhabitants in 1850, 241'706 in 2000 and 341'537 in 2023.