Guttannen is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

in the Interlaken-Oberhasli administrative district in the canton of

Bern Bern (), or Berne (), ; ; ; . is the ''de facto'' Capital city, capital of Switzerland, referred to as the "federal city".; ; ; . According to the Swiss constitution, the Swiss Confederation intentionally has no "capital", but Bern has gov ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

Origin of the name

Guttannen is the name of a meadow, which became the name of the municipality. It comes from the phrase ''ze den guoten tannen'' (by the good firs).

History

Guttannen is first mentioned in 1377 as ''Guotentannon''. During the Middle Ages it was part of the

Vogt An , sometimes simply advocate, (German, ), or (French, ), was a type of medieval office holder, particularly important in the Holy Roman Empire, who was delegated some of the powers and functions of a major feudal lord, or for an institutio ...

ei of Hasli and the

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

Meiringen Meiringen () is a municipality in the Interlaken-Oberhasli administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland. Besides the village of Meiringen, the municipality includes the settlements of Balm, Brünigen, Eisenbolgen, Hausen, Prasti, ...

. In 1334 the entire Vogtei was acquired by

. A chapel was built in the village in 1467 though it did not have a

baptismal font A baptismal font is an Church architecture, ecclesiastical architectural element, which serves as a receptacle for baptismal water used for baptism, as a part of Christian initiation for both rites of Infant baptism, infant and Believer's bapti ...

. When the entire Canton accepted the new faith of the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the papacy and ...

, the chapel was converted and remained under Meiringen. In 1713 it joined the parish of

Innertkirchen Innertkirchen is a village and Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the Interlaken-Oberhasli (administrative district), Interlaken-Oberhasli administrative district in Bern (canton), the canton of Bern in Switzerland. On 1 January 2014, ...

where it remained until it became an independent parish in 1816. The old chapel was damaged in a fire in 1723 and replaced with a new chapel which became a

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in com ...

when Guttannen became a parish. Following the 1798 French invasion, Guttannen became part of the

Helvetic Republic The Helvetic Republic (; ; ) was a sister republic of France that existed between 1798 and 1803, during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was created following the French invasion and the consequent dissolution of the Old Swiss Confederacy, ma ...

Canton of Oberland Oberland (German for ''Highlands'') was the name of a canton of the Helvetic Republic (1798–1803), corresponding to the area of the Bernese Oberland, with its capital at Thun. History After the French invasion of Switzerland in 1798, the old B ...

. With the 1803

Act of Mediation The Act of Mediation () was issued by Napoleon Bonaparte, French Consulate, First Consul of the French Republic on 19 February 1803 to abolish the Helvetic Republic, which had existed since the invasion of Old Swiss Confederacy, Switzerland by F ...

it returned to the Canton of Bern and the Oberhasli district. For most of its history the villagers lived from farming on the valley floor, seasonal alpine herding and trade over the

Grimsel Pass The Grimsel Pass (; ; ) is a mountain pass in Switzerland, crossing the Bernese Alps at an elevation of . The pass connects the Haslital, the upper valley of the river Aare, with the upper valley of the Rhône. In so doing, and as the Aare is a t ...

. Due to the short growing season and poor soil many residents mined lead or zinc or carved wood or

soapstone Soapstone (also known as steatite or soaprock) is a talc-schist, which is a type of metamorphic rock. It is composed largely of the magnesium-rich mineral talc. It is produced by dynamothermal metamorphism and metasomatism, which occur in sub ...

. Many residents emigrated to escape the poverty. In the 17th and 18th centuries they went to Germany or the Swiss Plateau, while in the late 18th and 19th centuries they went to the United States and settled in the Carolinas, Pennsylvania and Kentucky. In the early 19th century mountain climbers began to come to Guttannen to explore the high peaks above the valley. In 1811-12 the Finstaarhorn was climbed and by the 1830s

Louis Agassiz Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz ( ; ) FRS (For) FRSE (May 28, 1807 – December 14, 1873) was a Swiss-born American biologist and geologist who is recognized as a scholar of Earth's natural history. Spending his early life in Switzerland, he recei ...

had popularized mountain climbing and trained guides in Guttanen. The Grimsel Pass road (built 1894-95) further opened up the village to trade and tourism. The construction of five

hydroelectric Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is Electricity generation, electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies 15% of the world's electricity, almost 4,210 TWh in 2023, which is more than all other Renewable energ ...

dams and six reservoirs in the Grimsel Pass, between 1925 and 1975, brought prosperity to the village. The Kraftwerke Oberhasli (KWO) company was founded in 1925 to manage the power plants and today is the largest employer in Guttannen. A modern road was built over the pass over a 26-year period (1960-1986).

Geography

Guttannen lies in the

Bernese Oberland The Bernese Oberland (; ; ), sometimes also known as the Bernese Highlands, is the highest and southernmost part of the canton of Bern. It is one of the canton's five administrative regions (in which context it is referred to as ''Oberland'' witho ...

near Grimsel Pass. It is the highest settlement in the

Haslital The Oberhasli is a historical ''Landvogtei (Switzerland), Landvogtei'' or ''Talschaft'' in the Bernese Highlands, Switzerland, bordering on the cantons of Canton of Obwalden, Obwalden (OW), Canton of Nidwalden, Nidwalden (NW), Canton of Uri, Uri ...

, and the municipality encompasses the upper stretches of that valley as far as the summit of the Grimsel Pass. The adjacent municipalities from the north clockwise are Innertkirchen, Obergoms, Münster-Geschinen, Fieschertal and

Grindelwald Grindelwald is a village and Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the Interlaken-Oberhasli (administrative district), Interlaken-Oberhasli administrative district in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Bern (canton), Berne. In additio ...

. The

Aare The Aare () or Aar () is the main tributary of the High Rhine (its discharge even exceeds that of the latter at their confluence) and the longest river that both rises and ends entirely within Switzerland. Its total length from its source to i ...

springs from glaciers in Guttannen. There are four lakes in the municipality: Lake Oberaar, Lake Grimsel, Lake Räterichsboden and Lake Gelmer. In the western part of the

are the mountains

Schreckhorn The Schreckhorn (4,078 m) is a mountain in the Bernese Alps, Bernese Swiss Alps, Alps. It is the highest peak located entirely in the canton of Bern. The Schreckhorn is the northernmost List of Alpine four-thousanders, Alpine four-thousander and ...

, Lauteraarhorn,

Finsteraarhorn The Finsteraarhorn () is a mountain lying on the border between the cantons of Canton of Bern, Bern and Valais. It is the highest mountain of the Bernese Alps and the List of prominent mountains of Switzerland, most prominent peak of Switzerland. ...

, Agassizhorn and Sidelhorn. Guttannen also includes Finsteraar Glacier, Lauteraar Glacier,

Unteraar Glacier The Unteraargletscher (), literally "Lower Aare-Glacier", is the larger of the two sources of the Aare river in the Bernese Alps. It emerges from the association of the Finsteraargletscher (near the Finsteraarhorn) and the Lauteraargletscher (n ...

, Grueben Glacier, and Bächli Glacier. By Swiss standards, the municipality is large in area; by comparison it is larger than the entire

Canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden Canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden ( ; ; ; ), in English sometimes Appenzell Inner-Rhodes, is one of the 26 cantons forming the Swiss Confederation. It is composed of five districts. The seat of the government and parliament is Appenzell. It is ...

. In elevation it stretches from the valley floor which is between into the high alpine peaks of the Finsteraarhorn group. Guttannen has an area of . As of 2012, a total of or 3.8% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 9.3% is forested. The rest of the municipality is or 0.5% is settled (buildings or roads), or 3.7% is either rivers or lakes and or 82.6% is unproductive land.Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics
2009 data accessed 25 March 2010 During the same year, housing and buildings made up 0.1% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.3%. All of the forested land area is covered with heavy forests. Of the agricultural land, and 2.9% is used for alpine pastures. Of the water in the municipality, 3.0% is in lakes and 0.7% is in rivers and streams. Of the unproductive areas, 13.7% is unproductive vegetation, 45.6% is too rocky for vegetation and 23.3% of the land is covered by glaciers. On 31 December 2009 Amtsbezirk Oberhasli, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Verwaltungskreis Interlaken-Oberhasli.Nomenklaturen – Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz
accessed 4 April 2011

Coat of arms

The

blazon In heraldry and heraldic vexillology, a blazon is a formal description of a coat of arms, flag or similar emblem, from which the reader can reconstruct an accurate image. The verb ''to blazon'' means to create such a description. The visual d ...

of the municipal

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

is ''Or a Fir tree Sable trunked and eradicated Gules between two Mullets of the last in chief.''

Demographics

Guttannen has a population () of . , 7.0% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last year (2010-2011) the population has changed at a rate of -3.2%. Migration accounted for -3.9%, while births and deaths accounted for 0.3%.Swiss Federal Statistical Office
accessed 13 December 2013 Most of the population () speaks

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

(322 or 98.2%) as their first language, while one person speaks French and another speaks Romansh. , the population was 49.4% male and 50.6% female. The population was made up of 145 Swiss men (46.8% of the population) and 8 (2.6%) non-Swiss men. There were 143 Swiss women (46.1%) and 14 (4.5%) non-Swiss women.Statistical office of the Canton of Bern
accessed 4 January 2012 Of the population in the municipality, 223 or about 68.0% were born in Guttannen and lived there in 2000. There were 60 or 18.3% who were born in the same canton, while 23 or 7.0% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 10 or 3.0% were born outside of Switzerland. , children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 19% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 58.7% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 22.3%. , there were 126 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 178 married individuals, 19 widows or widowers and 5 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011 , there were 34 households that consist of only one person and 12 households with five or more people. , a total of 118 apartments (76.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 21 apartments (13.5%) were seasonally occupied and 16 apartments (10.3%) were empty.Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen
accessed 28 January 2011 In 2011, single family homes made up 57.5% of the total housing in the municipality. The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width: auto height:200 barincrement:45 PlotArea = top:20 left:35 bottom:20 right:35 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:560 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:100 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:20 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width: 35 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1764 from:start till:288 text:"288" bar:1850 from:start till:506 text:"506" bar:1860 from:start till:505 text:"505" bar:1870 from:start till:450 text:"450" bar:1880 from:start till:463 text:"463" bar:1888 from:start till:341 text:"341" bar:1900 from:start till:345 text:"345" bar:1910 from:start till:303 text:"303" bar:1920 from:start till:298 text:"298" bar:1930 from:start till:391 text:"391" bar:1941 from:start till:515 text:"515" bar:1950 from:start till:557 text:"557" bar:1960 from:start till:430 text:"430" bar:1970 from:start till:394 text:"394" bar:1980 from:start till:384 text:"384" bar:1990 from:start till:374 text:"374" bar:2000 from:start till:328 text:"328" bar:2010 from:start till:306 text:"306"

Heritage sites of national significance

The ''Grimselstaumauer'' (Grimsel dam) and the associated Grimsel Pass hospice are listed as Swiss heritage site of national significance.

Politics

In the 2011 federal election the most popular party was the Swiss People's Party (SVP) which received 49.2% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the Conservative Democratic Party (BDP) (21.3%), the

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as environmentalism and social justice. Green party platforms typically embrace Social democracy, social democratic economic policies and fo ...

(10.5%) and the Social Democratic Party (SP) (8.3%). In the federal election, a total of 117 votes were cast, and the

voter turnout In political science, voter turnout is the participation rate (often defined as those who cast a ballot) of a given election. This is typically either the percentage of Voter registration, registered voters, Suffrage, eligible voters, or all Voti ...

was 49.6%.Swiss Federal Statistical Office 2011 Election
accessed 8 May 2012

Economy

, Guttannen had an unemployment rate of 0.48%. , there were a total of 218 people employed in the municipality. Of these, there were 72 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 24 businesses involved in this sector. 58 people were employed in the

secondary sector In macroeconomics, the secondary sector of the economy is an economic sector in the three-sector theory that describes the role of manufacturing. It encompasses industries that produce a finished, usable product or are involved in constructi ...

and there were 6 businesses in this sector. 88 people were employed in the

tertiary sector The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector (raw materials) and the ...

, with 13 businesses in this sector. There were 172 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 39.0% of the workforce. there were a total of 153

full-time equivalent Full-time equivalent (FTE), or whole time equivalent (WTE), is a unit of measurement that indicates the workload of an employed person (or student) in a way that makes workloads or class loads comparable across various contexts. FTE is often use ...

jobs. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 30, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 52 of which 7 or (13.5%) were in manufacturing and 5 (9.6%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 71. In the tertiary sector; 3 or 4.2% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 3 or 4.2% were in the movement and storage of goods, 54 or 76.1% were in a hotel or restaurant, 4 or 5.6% were in education. , there were 12 workers who commuted into the municipality and 94 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 7.8 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. A total of 78 workers (86.7% of the 90 total workers in the municipality) both lived and worked in Guttannen.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb
accessed 24 June 2010 Of the working population, 29.7% used public transportation to get to work, and 36.6% used a private car. In 2011 the average local and cantonal tax rate on a married resident, with two children, of Guttannen making 150,000 CHF was 11.5%, while an unmarried resident's rate was 16.9%. For comparison, the average rate for the entire canton in the same year, was 14.2% and 22.0%, while the nationwide average was 12.3% and 21.1% respectively. In 2009 there were a total of 134 tax payers in the municipality. Of that total, 32 made over 75,000 CHF per year. There were 3 people who made between 15,000 and 20,000 per year. The greatest number of workers, 41, made between 50,000 and 75,000 CHF per year. The average income of the over 75,000 CHF group in Guttannen was 97,497 CHF, while the average across all of Switzerland was 130,478 CHF. In 2011 a total of 1.0% of the population received direct financial assistance from the government.

Religion

Guttannen is an evangelical-reformed

. From the , 282 or 86.0% belonged to the

Swiss Reformed Church The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), formerly named Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches until 31 December 2019, is a federation of 25 member churches – 24 cantonal churches and the Evangelical-Methodist Church of Switzerland. The P ...

, while 19 or 5.8% were

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

. Of the rest of the population, there were 2 individuals (or about 0.61% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There was 1 individual who was

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

. 7 (or about 2.13% of the population) belonged to no church, are

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. (page 56 in 1967 edition) It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer to ...

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

, and 17 individuals (or about 5.18% of the population) did not answer the question.

Climate

Between 1981 and 2010 Guttannen had an average of 152.2 days of rain or snow per year and on average received of

precipitation In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls from clouds due to gravitational pull. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, rain and snow mixed ("sleet" in Commonwe ...

. The wettest month was May during which time Guttannen received an average of of rain or snow. During this month there was precipitation for an average of 14.8 days. The month with the most days of precipitation was June, with an average of 15, but with only of rain or snow. The driest month of the year was October with an average of of precipitation over 10.4 days., the Guttannen weather station elevation is 1055 meters above sea level.

Education

In Guttannen about 55.6% of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 8.4% have completed additional higher education (either

university A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...

or a ''

Fachhochschule A (; plural ), abbreviated FH, is a university of applied sciences (UAS), in other words a Hochschule, German tertiary education institution that provides professional education in many applied sciences and applied arts, such as engineering, te ...

''). A total of 16 Swiss men have completed some form of tertiary schooling listed in the census. The Canton of Bern school system provides one year of non-obligatory

Kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cen ...

, followed by six years of Primary school. This is followed by three years of obligatory lower Secondary school where the students are separated according to ability and aptitude. Following the lower Secondary students may attend additional schooling or they may enter an

apprenticeship Apprenticeship is a system for training a potential new practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study. Apprenticeships may also enable practitioners to gain a license to practice in a regulat ...

. During the 2011-12 school year, there were a total of 31 students attending classes in Guttannen. There was one kindergarten class with a total of 6 students in the municipality. The municipality had 2 primary classes and 25 students. Of the primary students, 16.0% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 8.0% have a different mother language than the classroom language.Schuljahr 2011/12 pdf document
accessed 9 May 2013 , there were a total of 21 students living in and attending school in the municipality, while 15 students from Guttannen attended schools outside the municipality.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Municipalities of the canton of Bern Bernese Oberland Oberhasli Populated places on the Aare Cultural property of national significance in the canton of Bern