Immigration
Immigrants were not always popular. Fighting between Swiss and Italians in Zurich, the so-called "Italian riots", as depicted in the "Corriere della Domenica" of Rome, 9th August 1896© Swiss Federal Archive Bern
The outflow of Swiss was balanced by an inflow of foreigners, particularly from Germany, Italy and Austria.
Some of these immigrants were political refugees, many of them highly educated. The first big wave came after the collapse of the revolutionary movement in Switzerland's neighbours in 1830, and a second wave followed the defeat of the revolutions of 1848. In particular, many Germans found positions as teachers. When Zürich University was founded in 1833, all its teaching positions were filled by Germans. German refugees also taught at other schools and universities.
Other refugees brought industrial and entrepreneurial skills. One of these was Polish-born Antoine Norbert de Patek, joint founder of the Patek Philippe company which has been making watches in Geneva since 1845.
Many other immigrants, particularly from Italy, were brought in to provide the labour force for some of Switzerland's great engineering projects, such as the Gotthard and Simplon rail tunnels.
"How terrible, the number of learned people there are walking around Zurich these days. One almost hears more High German, French and Italian being spoken that our good old Swiss German."
Gottfried Keller (1819-90), Letter to a friend in Berlin, 1856