Name of Switzerland

The English name of Switzerland is a compound containing Switzer, an obsolete term for the Swiss, which was in use during the 16th to 19th centuries. The English adjective Swiss is a loan from French Suisse, also in use since the 16th century.

The name Switzer is from the Alemannic Schwiizer, in origin an inhabitant of Schwyz and its associated territory, one of the Waldstätten cantons which formed the nucleus of the Old Swiss Confederacy. The name originates as an exonym, applied pars pro toto to the troops of the Confederacy. The Swiss themselves began to adopt the name for themselves after the Swabian War of 1499, used alongside the term for "Confederates", Eidgenossen ("oath-fellows"), used since the 14th century.

The Swiss German name of the country is homophonous to that of the canton and the settlement, but distinguished by the use of the definite article (d'Schwiiz [tʃviːts] for the Confederation, but simply Schwyz [ʃviːts] for the canton and the town).

The toponym Schwyz itself is first attested in 972, as villa Suittes. Its etymology is uncertain, it may be either derived from a Germanic name in *swiþ- ‘strength’ or from either a Germanic (*swint-) or Celtic (*sveit-) word for "clearing". The name is recorded as Schwitz in the 13th century, and in the 17th to 18th century often as Schweitz. The spelling of y for [iː] originates as a ligature ij in 15th-century handwriting.

The Swiss chroniclers of the 15th and 16th centuries present a legendary eponymous founder, one Suit (Swit, Schwyt, Switer), leader of a population migrating from Sweden due to a famine. Suit is said to have defeated his brother Scheijo (or Scheyg) in single combat in a dispute over leadership of the new settlement. Petermann Etterlin (fl. 1470s, printed 1507).

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