WThe 1566 celestial phenomenon over Basel was a series of mass sightings of celestial phenomena above Basel, Switzerland. The Basel pamphlet of 1566 describes unusual sunrises and sunsets. Celestial phenomena were said to have "fought" together in the form of numerous red and black balls in the sky before the rising sun. The report is discussed among historians and meteorologists. The phenomenon has been interpreted by some ufologists to be a sky battle between unidentified flying objects. The leaflet written by historian Samuel Coccius reported it as a religious event. The Basel pamphlet of 1566 is not the only one of its kind. In the 15th and 16th centuries, many leaflets wrote of "miracles" and "sky spectacles".
WThe First War of Kappel was an armed conflict in 1529 between the Protestant and the Catholic cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy during the Reformation in Switzerland. It ended, without any single battle having been fought, with the first peace of Kappel.
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.
WBalthasar Hubmaier was an influential German Anabaptist leader. He was one of the most well-known and respected Anabaptist theologians of the Reformation.
WThe Rappenkrieg was a peasant uprising lasting from 1591–1594, involving a conflict between the Swiss city of Basel and the surrounding Prince-Bishopric of Basel.
WThe Reformation in Zürich was promoted initially by Huldrych Zwingli, who gained the support of the magistrates of the city of Zürich and the princess abbess Katharina von Zimmern of the Fraumünster Abbey, and the population of the city of Zürich and agriculture-oriented population of the present Canton of Zürich in the early 1520s. It led to significant changes in civil life and state matters in Zürich and spread to several other cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy, and thus initiated the Reformation in Switzerland.
WThe Second War of Kappel was an armed conflict in 1531 between the Protestant and the Roman Catholic cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy during the Reformation in Switzerland.
WSeveral illustrated chronicles were created in the Old Swiss Confederacy in the 15th and 16th centuries. They were luxurious illuminated manuscripts produced for the urban elite of Bern and Lucerne, and their copious detailed illustrations allow a unique insight into the politics and daily life of late medieval Switzerland on the eve of the Reformation. The most important of these chronicles are the works of the two Diebold Schillings, their luxurious execution, as well as their content reflecting the growing confidence and self-esteem of the leaders of the confederacy after their spectacular successes in the Burgundian Wars.1423 Konrad Justinger's chronicle (Bern) the original was lost, but a copy of the text survives in Jena. 1470 the "Tschachtlanchronik" by Bendict Tschachtlan und Heinrich Dittlinger Diebold Schilling the Elder, Bern: 1483 the "Berner Schilling", three volumes, covering the time from the foundation of Bern up to and including the Burgundy Wars. 1480s "Spiezer Schilling", a shorter one-volume edition 1484 "Zürcher Schilling" Diebold Schilling the Younger, nephew of Diebold Schilling the Elder: 1515 "Luzerner Schilling" 1515 Chronicle of Wernher Schodeler of Bremgarten. 1529–1546 Berner Chronik of Valerius Anshelm. 1576 Christoph Silberysen's compendium. 1587 "Wickiana" by Johann Jakob Wick, a compilation of various manuscripts and prints. 1626–1631 Schweitzer-Chronic by Michael Stettler of Bern.
WThe early modern history of the Old Swiss Confederacy and its constituent Thirteen Cantons encompasses the time of the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) until the French invasion of 1798.