Switzerland 1695

Apart from the fact that Switzerland never took part in any major conflict, the country also holds a unique position of being one of those very few landlocked countries that never significantly changed its political boundaries ever since it gained a sovereign status. The original Swiss confederacies of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden with no central executive authority formed a Waldstätten in 1291. Still, under the suzerainty of the Habsburg hegemony, Switzerland saw its first sovereign status in 1649 according to the Treaty of Westphalia. At this time, it bordered Franche-Comté, the Duchies of Savoy and Milan, and the fragmented Holy Roman Empire. Switzerland was surrounded by a multilinguistic jigsaw of German, Italian and French-speaking powers, much before any of these nations would join as a single sovereign. 

In 1798, just at the dusk of the 18th century, Eine und Unteilbare Helvetische Republik (Helvetic Republic One and Indivisible) was formed which would now become a playground of occasional French occupation in the coming centuries. Numerous times the French would invade and occupy Switzerland till the early 19th century when in 1815 the Allied powers formally accepted Switzerland's neutrality, a political state that continued even during the two World Wars. 

One of the official names of Switzerland is the Helvetic Republic, a name originating back to the Roman era when Helvetii tribe marked the easternmost boundaries of Gaul, a Roman territory. But if post-Renaissance maps are observed, the name Seqvanor (denoting the Sequani tribe) appears instead of Helvetii, as per a recreation of Roman Europe by Giovanni Giacomo de Rossi, an Italian engraver (1627-1691). The same creator mentions the name Svizzeri sandwiched between the French, German and Italian territories. On a 1700 dated map by Edward Wells (1667-1727), the name 'Switzerland' is clearly marked, landlocked between France, Italy and Germany. With little or no alterations, the Swiss frontiers and name remain unchanged to date. 

The Swiss attempt at colonisation and expansion was soon abandoned after a devastating defeat at the battle of Marignano (Melagnano, in today's Italy) in 1515, thus offering its territory for a constant neutral zone acting as a buffer between various European powers. Had this be the case with the other European powers, the face of European colonisation would have had a different history. Or possibly, if after every defeat in territorial expansion, the future plans of every European power was terminated, the age of colonisation would have never occurred. Apart from this, the only major territorial expansion took place in 1848 with the inclusion of Neuchâtel as a formal Swiss canton. During the 1815 session of Vienna Congress, the Swiss Confederation entered into an agreement of 'perpetual neutrality' and in 1920 this neutral state was given official status to the newly formed League of Nations, headquartered at Geneva. 

Below here is a recreated 1695 dated map of the Swiss Confederation, originally sketched by Alexis-Hubert Jallot, a French cartographer (1632-1712). The spellings are translated into English from the original labelling in French.