Falera

Falera

Falera ( [ fɐlɛʁɐ ]? / I, and German until 1969 officially German Fellers ) is a municipality in the district of Ilanz in the district Surselva the canton of Graubünden in Switzerland.

The origin of the name is unclear. Presumably it contains a pre-Roman tribe, who later allied himself with the Latin suffix - aria, which resulted in Sursilvan -era. Falera landmark is the church of St. Remigius from the 15th century.

• 7.1 settlement from the Bronze Age
• 7.2 megalithic Parc la Mutta
• 7.3 Planet
• 7.4 star Mirasteilas

Coat of arms

The coat of arms shows the old parish church, one of the oldest of the Grisons Oberland. The image used in a community seal of the church's patron saint was not used.

Geography

The municipality is located on a terrace on the left side of the slope of the Anterior Rhine Valley. Of the total area of ​​2235 ha community are 1432 ha agricultural Nutzgebiet (mostly Alpine farms ), 435 hectares of forest and woodland, 309 ha of unproductive area (mostly mountains) and 59 ha settlement area. The municipality has an interest in the preliminary glacier, while the popular ski mountain Crap Sogn Gion is for the most part within their boundaries. The municipality borders on Ilanz / Glion, Laax, sagogn and Schleuis.

Population

The population declined due to emigration 1850-1930 resistant ( 1850-1930: -28.2 %). After a huge growth spurt in the 1930s ( 1930 to 1941: 24 %), followed by a decade of stagnation between 1950 and 1970 a second wave of emigration ( 1950 to 1970: -16 %). Since then, the population is continuously growing strongly (1970-2011: 90 %).

Despite the development of tourism Falera has remained a farming village. Even today, there are fifteen farms. In the last decade, nine agricultural large firms have emerged.

Languages

Even today, the Grisons Romance is the language of the majority of the residents. 1990 still dominated 90% of the language, in 2000 78%. However, this majority is slipping away. 1880 gave 99 % of the population, 1941 97 % and 2000 67 % Romansh ( here the idiom Sursilvan ) as a mother tongue / main language. The development in recent decades indicates the following table:

End of 2012, 386 people, 66 % as a mother tongue / main language Romansh, 149 people, 26 % German, 46 people, 8% other languages ​​.

Religions - faiths

In previous years, the entire population of the Roman Catholic Church was a member. In 2012, there were 86 % Roman Catholic, 6% Evangelical Protestant, and 8% other religion or denomination Associated lots. Parish church is the Sacred Heart Church since 1904.

Origin - Nationality

From the end of 2004 546 inhabitants were 506 ( = 93%) of Swiss citizens. At the last census, 2000 479 persons were ( = 95 % ) Swiss nationals, including five dual citizen. Of the few immigrants were mostly from Portugal, Germany, Bosnia - Herzegovina, Italy and Austria. 2012, there were 511 inhabitants Swiss nationals and 70 foreigners.

Policy

Mayor since 2011 Wendelin Casutt - Cathomen. He succeeds Silvia Casutt.

History

The name of the village, and many place names derived from pre-Roman times and allow it to conclude that Falera has been inhabited continuously since the Middle Bronze Age.

In the 1940s, the then State Forester Walo Burkart discovered on the hilltop La Mutta, the wooded hill behind the Remigius church, the remains of a walled settlement from the Bronze Age; The oldest finds date to the 18th century before Christ returns. The excavations showed that the hill was inhabited during around 1400 years until 400 BC During this time, the settlement three times burned completely and was rebuilt. In the various cultural layers were found pottery shards, grinding stones, bronze sickles and the below mentioned Bronze Adel.

The Romans have left no traces in Falera. The clearest evidence of the Roman period can be found, however, in the Romance language, which goes back to Latin roots.

Several goods and the name of the local priest Lopus of Falariae 765 were first mentioned in the testament of Bishop Tello of Chur. The previous church of St. Remigius appears in the Carolingian Empire 841 land register. The village was subject to duty for centuries only the monastery of Disentis in the form of grain. In the High Middle Ages, the monastery Disentis, however, had assigned his rights for a certain time the Pfäfers Monastery and later the Lords of wild mountain Heiligenberg. With the founding of the Grey League in 1424 Falera became part of the court community Gruob / Ilanz. 1525, at the time of the Reformation, the village of Disentis Abbey ransomed. Like the other communities of the Three Leagues Falera was independently and managed himself. The cantonal constitution of 1854 the Grisons communities partially lost their independence and were placed under the cantonal authorities.

On the edge of the ravine Schleuiser the ruins are the ancestral castle of the lords of Wild Hill, Castle Wildenberg.

Tourism

The tourist development Falera began in the years between 1920 and 1930 with a small pension on Sep Casutt with open swimming pool. After the Second World War, the guests of Flims and Laax were driven in horse-drawn sleigh to Falera where they walked and refreshed in the Restaurant Alpina. Only with the expansion of the road from Laax to Falera 1950 - 1954 the conditions were met to open Falera in a large scale for tourism.

In 1959, the Tourist Office Falera was founded; first president was Giusep Casutt. In the sixties, locals rooms and apartments were rented out, often to the parents of children who had been housed since 1956 in the school holiday camps. In these years was the construction of the first holiday cottages. 1962 issued Falera society Crap Sogn Gion, the first concession for the construction of ski lifts up to Crap Sogn Gion. Negotiations on line management and financing, however, proved to be extremely complicated and so the chairlift Falera - Curnius not inaugurated until 1974. In 1995 she was converted to a quad chairlift.

1998 merged the tourist offices of Flims -Laax-Valera to Laax tourism. In 2000, this organization joined with the Mountain Marketing AG for today's Winter Resort " Laax " and into a summer destination " Flims " together, which extend over areas in the villages of Flims -Laax-Valera. It is operated by the Weisse Arena Group and marketed. The Weisse Arena Group began in 1996 with the merger of the cable cars Crap Sogn Gion and the cable cars Flims. The name of the Weisse Arena appeared somewhere on with the first Tariff Association, who introduced the Crap Sogn Gion mountain railways and Flims for the space Nagens. At first advertising posters of the seventies the community Falera was still in the process with the then common-name Fellers.

The village may be visited only with a permit; the cars have on a large parking lot (created in 1970 ) are parked at the entrance to the village. Falera can also be reached on foot via the Senda Sursilvana.

Attractions

Settlement from the Bronze Age

On the Mutta (or Muota = pre-Roman hill ) is a part of a settlement has been excavated from the Bronze Age from 1935 to 1943. The most important find was a 83 cm long needle wheel made ​​of bronze and is dated to the period around 1600 BC. You could have served as a calendar, with the synodic period of the planet Venus of 584/585 days can be calculated. The original of this unique discovery is on display in the Rhaetian Museum in Chur.

The enigmatic figure on the Mutta is engraved in a Verrucanoblock laughing face of a little man. The ' laughing Megalithic ' looks to the north-west, towards the sunset during the summer solstice. The figure was discovered in September 1984 by Ignaz Cathomen. Your age is indeterminate.

Copy of Disc needle

The ' laughing Megalithic '

Megalithic Parc la Mutta

The plateau of the Mutta Planezzas north and east of the church of St. Remigius is considered significant megalithic cult and astronomy facility. The many stone circles served both for acts of worship as well as for the calculation of calendar days. For agriculture to this altitude was the exact knowledge of Spring and the beginning of autumn for planting and harvesting of vital importance. The facility includes Peilsteine ​​to determine the summer solstice, the winter farmer, the winter solstice, the north-south direction, the equinox, the star KEPH Cassiopeia. A stone triangle in the center of the complex shows the ratio of the third row of the Pythagorean numbers 8:15:17. A stone with a moon arrow indicates a solar eclipse in 1089 BC. The inclination of the solar or calendar stone corresponds exactly to the inclination of the Earth. The system is connected by line of bearing with the environment. For example, are the three churches of Falera, Ladir Ruschein on the same southwestern cult line.

Planet

In the summer of 2003, was created on the initiative of the Astronomical Society of the Canton Grisons on the first part of the panorama path of Falera after Larnags / Laax a 1.4 km-long Planet.

Star Mirasteilas

The observatory is located above the church in Falera and was opened on 22 June 2007. Your centerpiece is a 1.6 ton, expensive Swiss francs 300 000 Cassegrain telescope with a diameter of 90 centimeters and a focal length of 9 meters.

Mirasteilas one of those Swiss observatories to observe the asteroids, comets and satellites and measure their path. The data are sent to the Minor Planet Center of the International Astronomical Union at Harvard University in Cambridge (USA) and from there to the U.S. space agency NASA.

On May 26, 2010 by the International Astronomical Union and the Minor Planet Center at the Harvard University in Cambridge, the name " Falera " for the asteroid was awarded with the serial number 233943.

Menhir on Planezzas

Standing stones in front of St. Remigius

The Mutta with the church of St. Remigius