Swiss nobility

Switzerland is a confederation of states of which each one has its own history.

In the Middle Ages we find in the various Swiss cantons only families of feudal nobility and some ennobled families abroad. In Switzerland there was a great number of families of dynastes who were vassals of the Holy Roman Empire, of the House of Savoy or of the Kingdom of Burgundy. This diversity prevented the birth of a state with monarchical central authority.

In Switzerland, since the 14th century, we can distinguish, except the particular cases, three modes of nobility:

The loss of nobility did not exist in Switzerland where the social classes were closer than in other countries. Juridically there is neither misalliance nor loss of nobility due to the manual work or to the trade. So Noble Jean Gambach was in 1442 a manufacturer of scythes, and Noble Louis de Daguet was a carter at the end of the 18th century. The only cases of loss of nobility were the illegitimate line or the voluntary renunciation. This last case was met in Fribourg in order to be able to reach the load of banneret; it was in particular the case for some lines of the families Fégely, Gottrau, Reynold, Reyff, etc..

Each state had its own constitution, its currency, its jurisdiction, its habits and customs, its history and so its own nobility. So it's necessary to understand the Swiss nobilities to specify some nobiliary characteristics of some "cantons".

From the 15th century there was a power's increasing of the cities and their citizens and consequently there was an integration of the feudal nobility into the middle-class of the cities. In some "cantons", as Bern, Fribourg, Soleure and Lucerne, the political power belongs consequently to an upper class which is formed with noble families and new families proceeding from the middle-class of the chief town of each state. These no noble families and the ancient noble families held the power with an hereditary right to the governmental loads. This matter of fact increased gradually and ended towards 1600 to the institution of a privileged class. In 1627 in Fribourg, this class was officialized by a letter known as "lettre des deux-Cents". Then this class were constitutionally composed with the families eligible for the Sovereign Councils. In Fribourg this class, the patriciate, was closed in 1684 and half-opened only at the end of the 18th century.

...
Wikipedia