Treaty of Baden 1585

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The Principality of Basel in the 16th century

In the Baden Treaty of 1585 the state relationship as well as the territorial and confessional sovereignty between Basel and the Duchy of Basel were regulated. The treaty was a great success for the Swiss Counter Reformation .

In the course of the 13th and 14th centuries, the Basel municipality increasingly emancipated itself from the sovereignty of the Prince-Bishop of Basel. From 1400 it began its own territorial policy and came into the Sisgau for the first time in the pledge possession of the prince-bishops. At the beginning of the 15th century, Basel had largely completed its expansion. In 1521 it finally renounced the episcopal city rule and in 1529 it joined the Reformation . In the weakness of the diocese of Basel until the 1570s succeeded in Basel, with most prince-bishop of the nearby communities Birsecks and departments running , Delémont and Freiberge to verburgrechten . The city protected the Reformation there and practically exercised rule, especially in the Birseck.

A turning point was brought about by the rebirth of the prince-bishopric when Bishop Jakob Christoph Blarer von Wartensee came to power in 1575. In 1579, he allied himself with the Catholic estates of the Swiss Confederation and demanded that Basel release the old prince-bishop's fiefs and pledges. Basel ran the risk of falling under the sovereignty of the prince-bishopric and losing its independence. Due to its Lutheran orientation at the time , it could not hope for the help of the Reformed cantons, which anyway shied away from another disastrous campaign such as the Second Chapel War of 1531. So Basel agreed to a federal award, 1585, in Tagsatzungsort Baden fared. This “Baden Treaty” stipulated that, with an enormous payment of 200,000 guilders , Basel came into the final possession of all the pledges and fiefs of the prince-bishopric it had acquired since 1400. In return, the castle rights with the prince-bishop's subjects were invalidated, whose reformed denomination could now be opposed by the prince-bishop. The re-Catholicization of Birseck was not connected to the canton of Basel (today part of the canton of Baselland) until the Congress of Vienna in 1815 .

The Basel council had to borrow money in order to even make the required payment. So that he could pay off the debt again, he increased the wine change in the Basel countryside. The displeasure about this led to the bloodless black war from 1591 to 1594.

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