Saubannerzug

It consisted of disgruntled men-at-arms from Central Switzerland who moved towards Geneva to enforce the payment of a sum of 24,000 Gulden owed to the Old Swiss Confederacy as ransom to escape looting (Brandschatz).

The company consisted of a core of about 700 mercenaries of Uri, Schwyz and Lucerne, who had participated in the Battle of Nancy, and who were unhappy with the distribution of the spoils.

They caused embarrassment for the Swiss urban elites in Bern, Zürich and Lucerne, who were engaged in diplomatic negotiations with Savoy and France, and who wanted to avoid the impression of not being in control of their own troops.

The banner used in this campaign showed a boar (sau being a term for wild pig) and a mace or club (kolben).

[1] Traditional Swiss historiography based on 15th and 16th century chroniclers such as Diebold Schilling depicted the Saubannerzug as rowdy march of youthful ruffians hatched out of drunken Fasnacht revelry, and indeed the term Saubannerzug in modern (journalistic) Swiss Standard German is used in the sense of hooliganism and rioting.