Muotathal is a village and 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' ...

Schwyz District Schwyz District is a district of the canton of Schwyz, Switzerland. It is both the largest and most populous of the six districts of the canton of Schwyz, accounting for around half its surface area, and 40% of the population. It has a population ...

in the

canton of Schwyz The canton of Schwyz ( ; ; ; ) is a Cantons of Switzerland, canton in central Switzerland between the Swiss Alps, Alps in the south, Lake Lucerne to the west and Lake Zürich in the north, centred on and named after the town of Schwyz. It is one ...

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 ...

. The eponymous valley, the Muotatal, is formed by the

Muota The Muota is a river in the Switzerland, Swiss canton of Schwyz and a tributary of Lake Lucerne. It has a length of . The Muota rises on the Ruosalp, an alpine pasture, alp to the north of the Glatten (mountain), Glatten on the border between the ...

, which joins

Lake Lucerne Lake Lucerne (, literally 'Lake of the four Waldstätte, forested settlements' (in English usually translated as ''forest cantons''), , ) is a lake in central Switzerland and the fourth largest in the country. Geography The lake has a compli ...

Brunnen Brunnen is a resort on Lake Lucerne in Switzerland, part of the municipality Ingenbohl (Canton of Schwyz), at . Brunnen railway station, on the Gotthard railway, is served by hourly InterRegio trains, and by lines S2 of the Stadtbahn Zug, wh ...

History

Muotathal is first mentioned in 1246 as ''Muthathal'' and ''Mutetal''. In 1799, 30 September – 1 October, during Suvorov's Swiss campaign (part of

War of the Second Coalition The War of the Second Coalition () (1798/9 – 1801/2, depending on periodisation) was the second war targeting French Revolution, revolutionary French First Republic, France by many European monarchies, led by Kingdom of Great Britain, Britai ...

), a numerically inferior

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

rearguard A rearguard or rear security is a part of a military force that protects it from attack from the rear, either during an advance or Withdrawal (military), withdrawal. The term can also be used to describe forces protecting lines, such as Line of c ...

fought the French troops in the Muotatal, covering the march of the main force, and inflicted a heavy defeat, thus saving the

Imperial Russian Army The Imperial Russian Army () was the army of the Russian Empire, active from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was organized into a standing army and a state militia. The standing army consisted of Regular army, regular troops and ...

's forces from possible destruction.See Alexander Suvorov#Suvorov's Swiss campaign

Geography

The village is located in the valley of the river

, the Muotatal, with which it shares the name. The municipality is located in a series of valleys on the eastern edge of the canton, on the borders with the cantons of

Uri Uri may refer to: Places * Canton of Uri, a canton in Switzerland * Úri, a village and commune in Hungary * Uri, Iran, a village in East Azerbaijan Province * Uri, Jammu and Kashmir, a town in India * Uri (island), off Malakula Island in V ...

and

Glarus Glarus (; ; ; ; ) is the capital of the canton of Glarus in Switzerland. Since 1 January 2011, the municipality of Glarus incorporates the former municipalities of Ennenda, Netstal and Riedern.alpine pasture Alpine transhumance is transhumance as practiced in the Alps, that is, a seasonal droving of grazing livestock between the valleys in winter and the high mountain pastures in summer (German language, German ' from the term for "seasonal mount ...

s) including Glattalp, Toralp, Charetalp and Goldplangg. The municipality Muotathal has an area of . Of this area, 32.8% is used for agricultural purposes, while 22% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 1% is settled (buildings or roads) and the remainder (44.2%) is non-productive (rivers, glaciers or mountains). The municipality includes the entry site of the Hölloch, which at over 200 km is the longest cave in Switzerland, and currently the second-longest in Europe.

Demographics

Muotathal has a population (as of ) of . , 5.2% of the population was made up of foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years the population has grown at a rate of 0.3%. Most of the population () speaks German (96.5%), with Albanian being second most common ( 2.5%) and Macedonian being third ( 0.3%).Swiss Federal Statistical Office
accessed 31-Aug-2009 the gender distribution of the population was 52.3% male and 47.7% female. The age distribution, , in Muotathal is; 1,069 people or 30.5% of the population is between 0 and 19. 1,017 people or 29.0% are 20 to 39, and 972 people or 27.7% are 40 to 64. The senior population distribution is 251 people or 7.2% are 65 to 74. There are 148 people or 4.2% who are 70 to 79 and 50 people or 1.43% of the population who are over 80.Canton Schwyz Statistics
accessed 27 August 2009 there are 1,154 households, of which 246 households (or about 21.3%) contain only a single individual. 154 or about 13.3% are large households, with at least five members. In the 2007 election the most popular party was the SVP which received 67.4% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the CVP (22%), the SPS (5.1%) and the FDP (4.5%). In Muotathal about 46.9% of the population (between age 25-64) have completed either non-mandatory upper secondary education or additional higher education (either university 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 ...

''). Muotathal has an unemployment rate of 0.67%. , there were 303 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 119 businesses involved in this sector. 512 people are 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 are 51 businesses in this sector. 414 people are 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 82 businesses in this sector. From the , 3,197 or 91.2% are

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 47 or 1.3% 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 are 14 individuals (or about 0.40% of the population) who belong to the Orthodox Church. There are 133 (or about 3.79% of the population) who are

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 are less than 5 individuals who belong to another church (not listed on the census), 34 (or about 0.97% of the population) belong 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 81 individuals (or about 2.31% of the population) did not answer the question. The historical population is given in the following table:

Weather

Muotathal has an average of 157.8 days of rain per year and on average receives 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 is June during which time Muotathal receives an average of of precipitation. During this month there is precipitation for an average of 15.9 days. The driest month of the year is October with an average of of precipitation over 15.9 days., the weather station elevation is 620 meters above sea level.

Gallery

Image:1973 ICF Canoe Slalom World Championships, Muotathal Switzerland 04.jpg, Muotathal during the 1973 ICF Canoe Slalom World Championships Image:1973 ICF Canoe Slalom World Championships, Muotathal Switzerland 03.jpg, Muotathal in 1973 Image:1973 ICF Canoe Slalom World Championships, Muotathal Switzerland 01.jpg, Muotathal in 1973 Image:Glatten.jpg, Lake Waldisee in the Bisistal southeast of Mutothal north of the

Glatten Glatten is a municipality in the district of Freudenstadt in Baden-Württemberg in Germany. Geography Geographical location The state-approved health resort Glatten is located about ten kilometers southeast of the county town of Freudenstadt, ...

mountain Image:ETH-BIB-Muotathal-LBS H1-021574.tif, Aerial view (1958)

References

External links

* {{Authority control Municipalities of the canton of Schwyz Reuss basin