WThe Battle of Laupen was fought in June 1339, between Bern and its allies on one side, and Freiburg together with feudal landholders from the County of Burgundy and Habsburg territories on the other. Bern was victorious, consolidating its position in the region. As a consequence of the conflict, the relations of Bern and the Swiss Confederacy tightened, resulting in Bern's permanent accession in 1353.
WThe Burgdorferkrieg or Kyburgerkrieg was a war in 1383-84 between the counts of Neu-Kyburg and the city of Bern for supremacy in the County of Burgundy in what is now Switzerland.
WThe 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 of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden were under the direct authority of the emperor without any intermediate liege lords and thus were largely autonomous.
WThe Gümmenenkrieg was a war between the emergent city-states of Bern and Fribourg in 1331-33 in what is now Switzerland. The war pitted Bern and the new Swiss Confederation against the Habsburg-supported city of Fribourg and local nobles. It was also the first in a series of battles that brought the Habsburgs and Fribourg into prominence in the County of Burgundy. The war ended without resolving anything and led to other wars between Bern and Fribourg.
WThe Battle of Morgarten occurred on 15 November 1315, when the men of Schwyz, with support of their allies of Uri and Unterwalden, ambushed a Habsburg army under the command of Duke Leopold I on the shores of Lake Ägeri, in the territory of Schwyz.
WThe Battle of Näfels was fought on 9 April 1388 between Glarus with its allies the Old Swiss Confederation, and the Habsburgs. It was a decisive Glarner victory despite being outnumbered sixteen to one.
WThe Rütlischwur is the legendary oath taken at the foundation of the Old Swiss Confederacy by the representatives of the three founding cantons, Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden, traditionally dated to 1291. It is named for the site of the oath-taking, the Rütli, a meadow above Lake Uri near Seelisberg. Recorded in Swiss historiography from the 15th century, the oath is notably featured in the play William Tell by Friedrich Schiller (1804).
WThe Battle of Sempach was fought on 9 July 1386, between Leopold III, Duke of Austria and the Old Swiss Confederacy. The battle was a decisive Swiss victory in which Duke Leopold and numerous Austrian nobles died. The victory helped turn the loosely allied Swiss Confederation into a more unified nation and is seen as a turning point in the growth of Switzerland.
WThe Battle of Sörenberg was fought in 1380, between the Entlebuch and Obwalden. It was the culmination of a conflict over the right to alpine pastures (alps). The immediate cause was a cattle raid at an alp now known as Schlachtalp, at the slope of the Brienzer Rothorn, above the village Sörenberg.
WWilliam Tell is a folk hero of Switzerland. According to the legend, Tell was an expert marksman with the crossbow who assassinated Albrecht Gessler, a tyrannical reeve of the Austrian dukes of the House of Habsburg positioned in Altdorf, in the canton of Uri. Tell's defiance and tyrannicide encouraged the population to open rebellion and a pact against the foreign rulers with neighbouring Schwyz and Unterwalden, marking the foundation of the Swiss Confederacy.