page_title: Surselva Region
section_title: Geography
hierarchical_section_title: Surselva Region / Geography
caption_attribution_description: Surselva bei Trun
context_page_description: Surselva Region is one of the eleven administrative districts in the canton of Graubünden in Switzerland. It was created on 1 January 2017 as part of a reorganization of the canton.
  Surselva Region has an area of 1,373.56 square kilometers, with a population of 21,483 as of 31 December 2018.
  It corresponds exactly to its predecessor, Surselva District, but the former subdistricts of Disentis, Ilanz, Lumnezia/Lugnez, Ruis and Safien have been abandoned.
  Surselva is the name of the valley of the Anterior Rhine in the local dialect of Romansh. The eponymous forest is that of the Flims rockslide; the region "below the forest" is Sutselva, where the Sutsilvan dialect used to be spoken.
context_section_description: The Surselva  encompasses the valley of the Vorderrhein/Rein Anteriur (the Surselva) and all its side valleys, from the source near the Oberalp Pass all the way down towards Reichenau (where the Vorderrhein joins the Hinterrhein/Rein Posteriur to form the Alpine Rhine). The region ends before that confluence at the huge forest on the giant debris of Flims Rockslide that is responsible for the name of the region: The debris area lack of water and soil and were ever left as a big forest as it was useless for farming. This forest (romonsch: silva) is the border for "Sur-silva" (meaning "above the forest").
  The Surselva is one of the few areas in Switzerland that is mainly Romansh-speaking (another notable valley being the Engadine, the valley of the Inn). There are a few German-speaking communities in the Surselva, e.g. Disentis/Mustér, with its Benedictine monastery, which dates back to 720, Obersaxen and Vals, which were founded in the thirteenth century by the Walser.
  
  A long-distance hike is signposted to follow the full length of the main valley of the Anterior Rhine.
caption: The Surselva near Trun
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