Mattstetten 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 Bern-Mittelland 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 ...

History

Mattstetten is first mentioned in 1201 as ''Mahtsteten''. During the Middle Ages,

Ministerialis The ''ministeriales'' (singular: ''ministerialis'') were a legally unfree but socially elite class of knights, administrators, and officials in the High Middle Ages in the Holy Roman Empire, drawn from a mix of servile origins, free commoners, and ...

(unfree knights in the service of a

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was a combination of legal, economic, military, cultural, and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe from the 9th to 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of struc ...

overlord) family of Mattstetten built a tower in the village. The family held the village as a

fief A fief (; ) was a central element in medieval contracts based on feudal law. It consisted of a form of property holding or other rights granted by an overlord to a vassal, who held it in fealty or "in fee" in return for a form of feudal alle ...

for the Dukes of Zähringen and then the Counts of Kyburg. In the 14th century the village and surrounding land was held by the Knightly family of Rohrmoos. In the 15th century it was combined with Urtenen and was held by several

ese patrician families including; the Diesbachs, the Bonstettens, the Willadings and the Erlachs. The local low court was in Urtenen, while the high court was in Zollikofen. In 1831 a village school was built. Previously students had attended school in Urtenen. The fields around the village were often flooded by the Urtenen river until the river channel was deepened (in 1780, 1855 and 1917) and levees were built in 1944–46. While the village remained generally rural and agrarian the population slowly grew. In 1965 the new neighborhoods of Schulhausbitz, Neumatt and Breite were built for the new residents. Today many of the residents commute to jobs in Bern.

Geography

Mattstetten has an area of . Of this area, or 49.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 33.7% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 15.3% is settled (buildings or roads), or 1.1% is either rivers or lakes.Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics
2009 data accessed 25 March 2010 Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 1.6% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 5.0% and transportation infrastructure made up 7.4%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.3% of the area Out of the forested land, all of the forested land area is covered with heavy forests. Of the agricultural land, 44.2% is used for growing crops and 5.0% is pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. The village is located in the Urtenen valley, with part on ''Krauchthaler'' Mountain. On 31 December 2009 Amtsbezirk Fraubrunnen, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Verwaltungskreis Bern-Mittelland.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 ''Gules two Swan Heads addorsed couped Argent beaked Or.''

Demographics

Mattstetten has a population () of . , 2.8% of the population are resident foreign nationals.Statistical office of the Canton of Bern
accessed 4 January 2012 Over the last 10 years (2000-2010) the population has changed at a rate of 1.6%. Migration accounted for 0.9%, while births and deaths accounted for 0.7%.
accessed 29 January 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 ...

(566 or 97.1%) as their first language, French is the second most common (4 or 0.7%) and Dutch is the third (3 or 0.5%). There are 2 people who speak

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

. , the population was 50.5% male and 49.5% female. The population was made up of 283 Swiss men (48.8% of the population) and 10 (1.7%) non-Swiss men. There were 281 Swiss women (48.4%) and 6 (1.0%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 124 or about 21.3% were born in Mattstetten and lived there in 2000. There were 261 or 44.8% who were born in the same canton, while 151 or 25.9% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 32 or 5.5% were born outside of Switzerland. , children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 18.4% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 62.6% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 19%. , there were 225 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 317 married individuals, 22 widows or widowers and 19 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011 , there were 42 households that consist of only one person and 17 households with five or more people. , a total of 206 apartments (93.2% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 14 apartments (6.3%) were seasonally occupied and one apartment was empty.Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen
accessed 28 January 2011 The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width:1020 height:210 PlotArea = top:10 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:610 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:100 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:20 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1764 from:start till:126 text:"126" bar:1850 from:start till:244 text:"244" bar:1860 from:start till:234 text:"234" bar:1870 from:start till:257 text:"257" bar:1880 from:start till:307 text:"307" bar:1888 from:start till:301 text:"301" bar:1900 from:start till:256 text:"256" bar:1910 from:start till:313 text:"313" bar:1920 from:start till:347 text:"347" bar:1930 from:start till:360 text:"360" bar:1941 from:start till:341 text:"341" bar:1950 from:start till:346 text:"346" bar:1960 from:start till:347 text:"347" bar:1970 from:start till:400 text:"400" bar:1980 from:start till:539 text:"539" bar:1990 from:start till:610 text:"610" bar:2000 from:start till:583 text:"583"

Heritage sites of national significance

The ''Dorfbrunnen'' (fountain) is listed as a 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 29.3% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the Conservative Democratic Party (BDP) (17.7%), the Social Democratic Party (SP) (11.8%) and the FDP.The Liberals (10%). In the federal election, a total of 275 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 58.1%.Swiss Federal Statistical Office 2011 Election
accessed 8 May 2012

Economy

, Mattstetten had an unemployment rate of 1.44%. , there were a total of 145 people employed in the municipality. Of these, there were 25 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 8 businesses involved in this sector. 13 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 4 businesses in this sector. 107 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 312 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 43.3% of the workforce. there were a total of 112

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 13, all in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 11, all in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 88. In the tertiary sector; 51 or 58.0% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 23 or 26.1% were in the movement and storage of goods, 10 or 11.4% were in a hotel or restaurant and 2 or 2.3% were technical professionals or scientists. , there were 68 workers who commuted into the municipality and 245 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 3.6 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb
accessed 24 June 2010 Of the working population, 26.3% used public transportation to get to work, and 47.8% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 91 or 15.6% 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 ...

, while 435 or 74.6% 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 ...

. Of the rest of the population, there were 32 individuals (or about 5.49% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There was 1 individual who was

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

ic. There were 2 individuals who were

Hindu Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...

. 31 (or about 5.32% 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 7 individuals (or about 1.20% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Mattstetten about 265 or (45.5%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 99 or (17.0%) 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 ...

''). Of the 99 who completed tertiary schooling, 74.7% were Swiss men, 21.2% were Swiss women. 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 2010-11 school year, there were a total of 46 students attending classes in Mattstetten. There was one kindergarten class with a total of 15 students in the municipality. Of the kindergarten students, 40.0% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 40.0% have a different mother language than the classroom language. The municipality had 2 primary classes and 31 students. Of the primary students, 3.2% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens).Schuljahr 2010/11 pdf document
accessed 4 January 2012 , there was one student in Mattstetten who came from another municipality, while 47 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Municipalities of the canton of Bern Cultural property of national significance in the canton of Bern