The 'Battle of
Laupen' () of
1339 was fought between the
Berne and its allies on one side, and
Habsburg together with
Burgundian allies on the other, with Berne victorious.
Prior to hostilities the City of Berne had undergone heavy expansion, however this expansion came at high expense to the feudal lords in the area. Angered, the feudal lords created a combined force of 12,000 men primarily heavy cavalry. Preceding the battle was an eleven days' siege of Laupen by a force of 12,000 under the command of
Louis the Bavarian and the
bishop of Basel (Johann II. von Munsingen). The siege was relieved on 21 June by a force of 6,000, consisting of Bernese, supported by
Swiss confederates, who had entered a military alliance with Berne in
1323, and other allies (
Simmental,
Weissenburg,
Oberhasli). The victory of the Bernese/Swiss against all odds, outnumbered two to one by a better equipped army, came as a surprise, and chronists record that comments like "God himself must have become a Bernese citizen" were heard among the retreating Habsburg troops. Comparable to the
Battle of Bannockburn 25 years earlier, Laupen was one of a string of battles presaging the definite decline of High Medieval heavy
cavalry (
knights) in the face of improving
pikemen tactics during the following century. The battle is also the first occasion for which use of the
Swiss cross as a badge to identify confederate troops is attested; it was shown on combatants' clothing as two stripes of textile, contrasting with the red
St. George's cross of Habsburg Austria, and with the
Saint Andrew's cross used by Burgundy and Maximilian I.
As a consequence of the conflict, the relations of Berne and the Swiss Confederacy tightened, resulting in Berne's permanent accession in
1353.
Sources
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Military History on the Web