page_title: Interlaken
section_title: Interlaken Monastery
hierarchical_section_title: Interlaken / History / Interlaken Monastery
caption_attribution_description: English: Castle Interlaken, canton of Bern, Switzerland Esperanto: Kastelo Interlaken, Kantono Berno, Svislando Deutsch: Schloss Interlaken, Kanton Bern, Schweiz
context_page_description: Interlaken is a Swiss town and municipality in the Interlaken-Oberhasli administrative district in the canton of Bern. It is an important and well-known tourist destination in the Bernese Highlands region of the Swiss Alps, and the main transport gateway to the mountains and lakes of that region.
  The town is located on the flat alluvial land called Bödeli between two lakes, Brienz to the east and Thun to the west, and alongside the river Aare, which flows between them. Transport routes to the east and west alongside the lakes are complemented by a route southwards into the near mountain resorts and high mountains, e.g. the famous high Alpine peaks of Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau, following upwards the Lütschine.
  Interlaken is the central town of a Small Agglomeration with the same name of 23,300 inhabitants.
  The official language of Interlaken is German, but the main spoken language is the local variant of the Alemannic Swiss German dialect.
context_section_description: The Interlaken Monastery was first mentioned in 1133 when Lothair III, Holy Roman Emperor took it under his protection. By 1247, there were also women at the monastery. During the 13th century the monastery's influence spread throughout the neighboring area and into the Aare and Gürbe valleys. They eventually had authority over two dozen churches along with a number of villages and farms and became the largest religious landholder in the region.
  During the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century, the monastery grew and prospered. However, in 1350 a period of crises and conflicts led to a decline in the number of monks and nuns and increasing debt. A document from 1310, indicates that there were 30 priests, 20 lay brothers, and 350 women at the monastery. In contrast, in 1472 there were only the provost, the prior, nine ordinary canons, seven novices and 27 nuns. At this time, the monastery also had problems with its tenants and neighbors. In 1348, the people of Grindelwald and Wilderswil joined a mutual defense league with Unterwalden. Bern responded with a military expedition to the Bernese Oberland, which ended in defeat for Unterwalden and its allies. In 1445 the Evil League (Böser Bund) rose up in the Oberland near Interlaken and fought against Bernese military service and taxes following the Old Zürich War.
  During the 14th century, the canons and nuns stopped following most of the monastic rules. In 1472 a violent dispute between the men and the women's convents resulted in two visitations by the Bishop of Lausanne who noted serious deficiencies. The provost was arrested and some of the canons were replaced by canons from other convents. Despite the reform measures the nun's convent was closed in 1484 and its property transferred to the newly founded monastery of St. Vincent in Berne.
  During the Protestant Reformation, the monastery was secularized in 1528. The canons received a financial settlement and the properties were now managed by a Bernese bailiff. The tenants of the monastery who had expected the abolition of allowed interest responded by rioting, which was suppressed by Berne.
  After the Reformation, Berne created the Interlaken bailiwick from the monastery lands. Part of the monastery building was used as the headquarters of the district administration, while the rest was used as an indigent hospital. In 1562-63 Berne converted the monastery church's choir into a granary and a wine cellar. In 1746-50 the west wing was demolished and Governor Samuel Tillier built the so-called New Castle. It has remained the center of administration for the Interlaken District since that time.
caption: The New Castle was built in 1746–50 on the site of the monastery's west wing
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D40X", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Ver.1.00", "Image DateTime": "2011:07:21 17:35:12", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "2294", "Image XPKeywords": "[50, 0, 48, 0, 49, 0, 49, 0, 45, 0, 48, 0, 55, 0, 45, 0, 50, 0, 49, 0, ... ]", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "300", "Thumbnail YResolution": "300", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "33674", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5215", "Thumbnail YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/200", "EXIF FNumber": "63/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Unidentified", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2011:07:21 17:35:12", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2011:07:21 17:35:12", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "18/5", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash fired, auto mode, return light detected", "EXIF FocalLength": "18", "EXIF SubSecTime": "50", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "50", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "50", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3872", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2592", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "33422", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[0, 2, 0, 2, 1, 2, 0, 1]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "27", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF Padding": "[]", "EXIF OffsetSchema": "4100"}