Moosseedorf

Moosseedorf is a municipality in the Bern-Mittelland administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland.

In the 18th and early 19th Century, it officially became Moosseedorf to avoid confusion with Seedorf in the District of Aarberg, which is also in the Canton of Bern.

[3] Two of the largest paleolithic sites in Switzerland, Moosbühl I and II, are located on a low hill near Moossee Lake.

Other discoveries include a needle of bone, ochre beads for dye, lignite pearls, a female statuette made from jet (height 2.2 cm [0.87 in]) as well as fragments of imported amber from the Baltic region.

A number of animal skeletons and bones show that the people at Moosbühl mostly hunted reindeer.

The larger eastern site contained a number of Cortaillod culture pottery fragments from the first half of the 4th millennium BC.

In 1886 workers excavating a site for a monument to the Battle of Grauholz, allegedly discovered a late-Bronze Age grave, which probably dated to around 1300 BC.

[3] In 2011 the remains of a prehistoric dugout canoe were found during construction work on the premises of the public swimming pool at lake Moossee.

Today, they are shown to the public in a custom made display case close to where they were found.

[4] During the Middle Ages the village belonged to the Kyburg Ministerialis (unfree knights in the service of a feudal overlord) family of Seedorf or Moser.

One well documented record comes from 1242 when they quarreled with the Priory of St. Peter's Island over the patronage rights to Moosseedorf's village church.

They ruled over Moosseedorf from their water castle which was located about 100 meters (330 ft) northeast of the village church.

In 1528 Bern adopted the Protestant Reformation and secularized all Bernese monasteries including the Münchenbuchsee Commandery.

The first attempt to drain the marshy land around the lake was made in the 1770s by Johann Rudolf Tschiffeli.

Around 1780 the course of the Urtenen river was corrected and its water level dropped, opening up new farmland in the Moossee valley.

Large shopping centers, industrial companies and small businesses moved into the growing municipality.

In 1987 the Tannacker Foundation built a facility to provide support, employment and housing for the region's disabled.

The municipality also includes part of the military training base Im Sand, which was established in 1901–12.

The municipality includes the village of Moosseedorf and the hamlets of Sand, Tannacker and Anteil am See.

[7] The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Azure over three barrulets wavy Argent a Boat with an Oar Or.

The historical population is given in the following chart:[3][14] The paleolithic settlement at Moosbühl is listed as a Swiss heritage site of national significance.

In the tertiary sector; 844 or 31.5% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 593 or 22.1% were in the movement and storage of goods, 89 or 3.3% were in a hotel or restaurant, 869 or 32.4% were technical professionals or scientists, 10 or 0.4% were in education and 137 or 5.1% were in health care.

This is followed by three years of obligatory lower Secondary school where the students are separated according to ability and aptitude.

Moosbühl site
Dugout canoe of lake Moossee
Moosseedorf village church
Moossee Lake in winter
Aerial view from 300 m by Walter Mittelholzer (1925)
Lake Moossee
Interior of the Swiss Reformed Moosseedorf church