History of the villages of the Delémont district (Jura)
The 51 documented localities of the Delémont district, in the canton of Jura. Each page covers the origin of the name, the main stages of its history and its remains, with sources.
Towns and villages 44
Bassecourt
Its very rich 6th-7th century cemetery makes Bassecourt the probable chief place of the Merovingian Sornegau. In the 20th century the village made watch cases.
JUBerlincourt
Under the Ancien Régime its mill belonged to Bellelay Abbey. Its chapel now holds stained glass by Maurice Estève.
JUBoécourt
South of Les Rangiers, a free village of the Delémont valley where the abbey of Bellelay owned two mills and the church. At Les Montoyes a Late Bronze Age settlement precedes a Gallo-Roman farmstead.
JUBourrignon
The restoration of its baroque church of Saint-Sébastien in 1974-1977 revealed a hoard of 17th-century coins.
JUChâtillon
In 1975 this street village south of Delémont, on the new border between Bern and Jura, chose the canton of Jura. Since the 12th century it had belonged to the chapter of Moutier-Grandval.
JUChoindez
In 1913 the Von Roll foundry at Choindez, one of Switzerland's main ironworks, employed over 700 workers. By 2000 the locality had only 24 inhabitants.
JUCorban
In the eastern part of the Val Terbi, the village where a hoard of 104 Roman denarii was found in 1892, and which chose the canton of Jura in 1975.
JUCourcelon
Recorded in 1139 as « curtem de Curzelun », this street village above the Scheulte bore a German name in 1320, « Solendorff ». It now belongs to the municipality of Courroux.
JUCourchapoix
On 7 September 1975 Courchapoix, which had become a border municipality after the plebiscites, chose to join the canton of Jura.
JUCourfaivre
Courfaivre saw the Condor cycle factory founded in 1893, and its church received windows by Fernand Léger in 1954, then a tapestry by Jean Lurçat.
JUCourrendlin
Listed in 866 among the possessions of the abbey of Moutier-Grandval, the street village on the Birs saw the Von Roll blast furnace of Choindez fired up in 1846, at the mouth of the Moutier gorge.
JUCourroux
On the Roc de Courroux a Late Bronze Age village guarded the entrance to the Delémont valley. Karl Lüdin excavated it for more than fifty years from 1923.
JUCourtemelon
The Jura agricultural school, housed in Porrentruy castle, needed land: in 1927 it moved to Courtemelon, where it would become the Fondation rurale interjurassienne.
JUCourtételle
In the basilica of Saint-Maurice at Courtételle the duke of Alsace reportedly met the first abbot of Moutier-Grandval in 675. The village was one of the thirteen free villages of the Delémont valley.
JU · TownDelémont
Made a town by a charter of liberties on 6 January 1289, the former summer residence of the Prince-Bishops of Basel has hosted the Jura parliament and government since 1979.
JUDevelier
Between 550 and 750, six farms at Develier along the La Pran stream housed several forges working the iron of the region.
JUDevelier-Dessus
In 1837 residents of the hamlet built their own chapel. Dedicated to Saint Philomena, it has become the ecumenical Chapel of Unity.
JUEderswiler
The only German-speaking municipality in the canton of Jura, Ederswiler voted against its creation in 1974, by 42 votes to 35, but could not join the Laufen district.
JUGlovelier
One of the thirteen free villages of the Delémont valley, a parish seat since the 12th century, now a rail junction between the Delémont-Delle line and the Jura Railways.
JU · Merger 2013Haute-Sorne
Five communes joined in 2013 after a close vote, 1'464 yes to 1'390 no, without Boécourt or Saulcy.
JU · Lost villageLa Pran
Archaeological site of a vanished Merovingian hamlet of farmers and smiths along the Pran stream, in the municipalities of Develier and Courtételle.
JULa Racine
Hamlet of Saulcy recorded as early as 1181, almost a century and a half before the village's first mention in 1327.
JULes Forges
To limit his principality's debts, the Prince-Bishop of Basel reopened the Undervelier mine and foundry in 1599. The hamlet lived from iron until 1880.
JULes Riedes-Dessus
Hamlet of Soyhières on the right bank of the Birse, detached from Courroux and made a burgher commune in 1856. Its burghers all bear the name Joray.
JULöwenbourg
Between 75'000 and 65'000 years ago, Neanderthals knapped flint here: their workshop is the second most important in Switzerland, after Alle.
JULucelle
Swiss part, in the municipality of Pleigne, of the border hamlet of Lucelle, which grew up around a Cistercian abbey founded in 1123-1124 whose site lies in France (Haut-Rhin).
JUMervelier
Village in the Val Terbi, at the foot of the Scheulte pass on the Delémont-Balsthal road, a former locality of the provostry of Moutier-Grandval that remained Catholic.
JUMettembert
A small village in an isolated valley north-west of Delémont, whose citizens decided in 1984 to gallicise its name: Mettemberg became Mettembert.
JUMontavon
Village in the municipality of Boécourt, on the old road linking the Ajoie to Delémont, with its Sainte-Anne chapel of 1898.
JUMontsevelier
As an enclave within the provostship of Moutier-Grandval, covered by Swiss neutrality, the village escaped French occupation from 1792 to 1797.
JUMovelier
Bought in 1454 by the Prince-Bishop of Basel, Movelier became one of the thirteen free villages of the Delémont valley. Until 1792 the abbey of Lucelle owned almost all its land.
JUPleigne
A former free village of the Delémont valley, at 809 m near the Alsatian border, Pleigne includes the Löwenbourg site, visited from the Middle Palaeolithic onwards for its flint.
JURebeuvelier
Former free village of the Delémont valley whose territory includes the summit of the Raimeux, known for its Roches glassworks (1797-1867), now in the municipality of Courrendlin (merger of 1 January 2019).
JURossemaison
Catholic village of the former provostship of Moutier-Grandval, attached to the Bernese district of Moutier, which chose the canton of Jura by plebiscite on 7 September 1975.
JUSaulcy
Village in the district of Delémont, geographically part of the Franches-Montagnes, on the old road that linked the Delémont valley to Pierre Pertuis via Bellelay.
JUSceut
A municipality during the French period, Sceut was united with Glovelier by imperial decree in 1806, yet it still forms a separate burgher corporation.
JUSéprais
At Les Boulies near Séprais, two bloomery furnaces were already smelting iron ore in Merovingian times. The deposit was mined until the 19th century.
JUSoulce
Enfeoffed to the Münch of Münchenstein, Soulce was bought back by the Prince-Bishop of Basel in 1468. Its mill, with a channel of large stone slabs, bears the date 1747.
JUSoyhières
Soyhières gave its name to the counts who governed the Sornegau from the 11th to the 13th century from their castle, burned down in 1499 during the Swabian War.
JUUndervelier
Between the two gorges of the Sorne, at the foot of the Pichoux, Undervelier lived from iron: in 1599 the prince-bishop of Basel revived the Les Forges complex here.
JU · Merger 2013Val Terbi
Born of a seven-commune project, Val Terbi united Montsevelier, Vermes and Vicques in 2013, then Corban in 2018.
JUVellerat
Left in Bern despite voting for the Jura, Vellerat declared itself a « commune libre » in 1982. In 1996 the Swiss people approved its transfer to the canton of Jura.
JUVermes
Known from 866 through a cella of the abbey of Moutier-Grandval, Vermes keeps Gothic wall paintings in its church that were rediscovered in 1962.
JUVicques
A large Gallo-Roman villa, occupied until around 350, with a nine-room bath complex and a blue glass mosaic. Vicques later became one of the thirteen free villages of the Delémont valley.
Sites 7
Château de Raymontpierre
A small fortified castle built around 1594-1596 by Georges Hugué, ennobled in 1595 by Emperor Rudolf II under the name of Raymontpierre, as the administrative seat of his fief.
JU · SiteChâteau de Soyhières
Built around 1100 by the counts of Soyhières, the castle was destroyed by the Basel earthquake of 1356, then burned in 1499 during the Swabian War.
JU · SiteGrotte de Sainte-Colombe
Cave in the Sorne gorges, inhabited mainly in the Middle Bronze Age, later a Christian pilgrimage site recorded from the 13th century and still visited every 15 August.
JU · SiteNécropole de Saint-Hubert
A 6th and 7th-century cemetery whose grave goods suggest a prosperous population, even an aristocracy: Bassecourt was probably the chief town of the Merovingian Sornegau.
JU · SiteVerrerie de Roches
A glassworks founded in 1797 and active until 1867. Excavated before the A16 motorway was built, it yielded about 1'500 m² and 203 structures, including the furnace hall and the mill.
JU · SiteVilla romaine de Vicques
This large Gallo-Roman estate had its own baths, with a heated pool with three apses. In the Middle Ages two lime kilns were set up in its ruins.
JU · SiteVorbourg
Site of the Notre-Dame-du-Vorbourg chapel and the ruins of the castle of the knights of Telsperg, on a promontory above the Birse gorge, in the municipality of Delémont.