Switzerland
Swiss Shooting Festival Award White Metal Medal 30mm x 40mm
(Medallion) (23.90 grams)
KANT.SCHUTZEN.VEREIN BERN FELDSCHIESSEN AUSZEICHNUNG, Man with arrow leading
lion left on Coat-of-arms.
Ribbon Notes:
Red left, Black right, Silver and Yellow edges.
You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of
Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.
A
Schützenfest is a traditional festival or fair featuring a target shooting
competition in the cultures of both Germany and Switzerland.
At a
Schützenfest, contestants compete based on their shooting abilities, for example
by shooting at a wooden representation of an eagle. The winner of the
competition becomes the Schützenkönig (“king of marksmen”) until the next
year’s competition.
The commercially-organized Schützenfest of Hanover,
Germany, is the largest marksmen’s funfair in the world with more than 5,000
marksmen, 250 rides and inns, 5 large beer tents, and the “Marksmen’s Parade”.
The parade, with more than 10,000 participants from Germany and all over the
world and more than 100 bands, is 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) long. It is the longest
parade in the world. The landmark of the funfair is one of the highest
transportable Ferris wheels in the world. It is 60 metres (200 ft) high and can
transport 420 people in 42 cabins.
Medals
and decorations
Shooting
competitions are a way of life in the Germanic regions of Europe, especially in
Switzerland. The initial Swiss Federal Shooting Festival (Eidgenössisches
Schützenfest) was held in 1824. Federal contests along with cantonal level,
city, and club competitions have continued through to the present day.
Various awards for marksmanship have been won by the competitors. Shooting
medals and shooting cups are the most common forms of award. Books illustrating
and listing these awards have been published in Switzerland.
Swiss shooting medals were struck in a variety of metals including gold, silver,
bronze, white metal, and aluminum, with silver being the most common. Mintages
are very low with the average mintage of the 45 millimetres (1.8 in) silver
being 700-800 pieces. The scarcity of medals has increased over the years due to
the awards being melted for bullion, being lost, and general attrition. The size
of most medals range from 23 millimetres (0.91 in) to 62 millimetres (2.4 in)
with 45 millimetres (1.8 in) being the most prevalent.
Also minted to commemorate the Shooting Festival were shooting thalers. Swiss
shooting thalers began mintage in 1842, and continue being minted today. They
can be distinguished from shooting medals by their uniform size and temporary
legal tender status.
History
During the Middle Ages, many towns had to find ways to defend themselves from
gangs of marauders. For this reason clubs and associations were founded,
comparable to militias; these paramilitary associations were sanctioned for the
first time in the Law for the Defensive Constitution of the Towns by King
Henry I, and officially integrated into the towns’ defense plans. Accompanying
the military exercises and physical examinations of the towns’ contingents,
festivities were held combined with festive processions. Participants from other
parishes and at times even the feudal heads of state were also invited to these
Marksmen’s Courts (Schützenhöfe). However, the self-confident spirit
of the townsfolk that marked these festivities was not always regarded
positively by the authorities. For this reason, different traditions developed
in different regions. The military significance lessened over the course of the
centuries and became meaningless with the creation of regular troops and
garrisons for national defence. The Schützenfests however continued in the form
of a regional patriotic tradition.
Switzerland
Schützenfests played a central role in the Old
Swiss Confederacy, during the 15th century, participants shooting the crossbow,
contributing significantly to the coherence between the individual cantons. The
Schützenfest of 1849 in Aarau figures prominently in Gottfried Kellers
Das Fähnlein der sieben Aufrechten, where Keller portrays the shooting clubs
as vital for the preservation of direct democracy in the young Swiss federal
state. Today a Swiss Federal Schützenfest counts 50’000 marksmen during 4
weeks.
Eidgenössische (federal) Schützenfest are organized
by the Schweizerischer Schützenverein since 1824.
Switzerland,
officially the Swiss Confederation (Latin: Confoederatio Helvetica,
hence its abbreviation CH), is a federal parliamentary republic consisting of
26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities, the so-called
Bundesstadt (“federal city”). The country is situated in Western and Central
Europe, where it is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany
to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland is a
landlocked country geographically divided between the Alps, the Swiss Plateau
and the Jura, spanning an area of 41,285 km2 (15,940 sq mi). While
the Alps occupy the greater part of the territory, the Swiss population of
approximately 8 million people is concentrated mostly on the Plateau, where the
largest cities are to be found. Among them are the two global cities and
economic centres of Zürich and Geneva.
The establishment of the Swiss
Confederation is traditionally dated to 1 August 1291, which is celebrated
annually as Swiss National Day. It has a long history of armed neutrality-it has
not been in a state of war internationally since 1815-and did not join the
United Nations until 2002. It pursues, however, an active foreign policy and is
frequently involved in peace-building processes around the world. Switzerland is
also the birthplace of the Red Cross and home to numerous international
organizations, including the second largest UN office. On the European level, it
is a founding member of the European Free Trade Association and is part of the
Schengen Area – although it is notably not a member of the European Union, nor
the European Economic Area. Switzerland comprises four main linguistic and
cultural regions: German, French, Italian and the Romansh-speaking valleys.
Therefore, the Swiss, although predominantly German-speaking, do not form a
nation in the sense of a common ethnic or linguistic identity; rather, the
strong sense of identity and community is founded on a common historical
background, shared values such as federalism and direct democracy, and Alpine
symbolism.
Switzerland has the highest nominal wealth per adult (financial
and non-financial assets) in the world according to Credit Suisse and
eighth-highest per capita gross domestic product on the IMF list. However,
Switzerland is also the most expensive country in the world to live in, as
measured by the price level index.
Swiss citizens have the second-highest
life expectancy in the world on the UN DESA list. Switzerland is tied with the
Netherlands for the top rank on the Bribe Payers Index indicating very low
levels of business corruption. Moreover, for the last five years the country has
been ranked first in economic and tourist competitiveness according to the
Global Competitiveness Report and the Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Report
respectively, both developed by the World Economic Forum. Zürich and Geneva have
each been ranked among the top cities with the highest quality of life in the
world, with the former coming second globally according to Mercer. However,
Mercer also rates those two cities as the fifth- and sixth- most expensive
cities in the world to live in.
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