Werner Schodoler

Schodoler's hometown Bremgarten during the Old Zurich War , in the Swiss Chronicle.

Werner Schodoler (also Wernher Schodoler ; * 1490 in Bremgarten , † October 15, 1541 in Bremgarten) was a Swiss chronicler . He was the author of the Swiss Federal Chronicle , the youngest of the Swiss illustrated chronicles .

The eldest son of the Bremgarten mayor Heinrich Schodoler attended the city's Latin school as a child . Since his parents died early, he didn't have the money to study at a university. Instead, he moved to Bern at the age of 13 and trained as a clerk and registry clerk in the city chancellery. There he got to know the Swiss pictorial chronicles, including the Bern Chronicle by Diebold Schilling the Elder , and was inspired by them.

In 1508 he returned to Bremgarten and at the age of 19 became town clerk. In 1520 he rose to the office of mayor himself. In 1525 the turmoil of the Reformation reached Bremgarten. Schodoler clung to the old faith, but took on a mediating role. When the Reformed came to power in 1529, he was deposed. After the Second Kappel War of 1531, the city returned to the Catholic camp and re-elected Schodoler as mayor. In 1541 he died of the plague .

Between 1510 and 1535, Schodoler wrote the Swiss Federal Chronicle out of private interest and without an official mandate, which he published in three volumes at his own expense. He commissioned the illustrations and did not originate from himself. He took the text on the events further back from older chronicles, and wrote the descriptions of the more recent events himself of Lombardy . Presumably he was an eyewitness to the battle of Marignano .

An alley in the lower town of Bremgarten, the Schodolergasse, was named in his honor .

literature

• Walter Muschg: The Swiss illustrated chronicles of the 15./16. Century ; Atlantis Verlag, Zurich 1941
• Edgar Bonjour , Richard Feller : Historiography of Switzerland from the late Middle Ages to the modern age. Helbing and Lichtenhahn, Basel / Stuttgart 1979.

Web links

Commons : Werner Schodoler  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Federal Chronicle of Werner Schodoler
• Anton Wohler: Schodoler [Schodeler], Werner. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• NZZ Archive, 1951, The Old Zurich War as reflected in the Schodoler Chronicle (PDF; 4.1 MB)