Törbel

View from Bern to Toerbel

Toerbel ( Valais German: Terbil ) is a municipality in the district of Visp in the German-speaking part of the canton of Valais in Switzerland.

• 4.1 Stadel
• 4.2 mill
• 4.3 Backhaus

Geography

The old village center is situated high above the Visp valley to 1,500 m above sea level. M.. The village is dominated by the tanned by the sun houses and narrow alleys, as well as a very closed design.

The lowest point in the municipality is located to 770 meters, the highest point is the summit of Augstbordhorns to 2972 meters. The Moosalp ( 2042 m asl) is the Alp Toerbel the community and is used as a tourist area.

The municipality is bordered to the north by Toerbel Bürchen, on the northeast by Zeneggen, to the east by Stalden, to the south by Bern, on the southwest by Embd and to the west by Unterbaech.

Coat of arms

Blazon

The coat of arms adopted in 1945 wearing a big Taukreuz for Toerbel and symbolizes the main hamlet of castles, fields and wells. It follows the first, created in the early 20th century coat of arms to the Taukreuz.

Economy

From Toerbel the well-known Swiss bags made ​​from recycled army blankets come. These are made in Toerbel in a small factory of Karlen saddlery and Handels GmbH in hand.

Next come from Toerbel the paintings of artist Helen Güdel, which has been found in Toerbel a new home and the village is in several books in paintings.

Tourism

The tourist area Moosalp is used all year round, in winter as a ski resort, in summer for hiking.

The beginning of each summer also takes place of transhumance, in which more than 100 cows brought to the Moosalp. The Alpaufzug is accompanied by the Ringkuhkämpfen and a small folk festival.

In the summer takes place every year on the last Sunday of July, the traditional Alpine Festival held, which takes place every year a folkloric parade and up to 5000 attracts visitors.

Traffic

Toerbel is good transport links. It leads a road from Stalden to Törbel and then to the Moosalp. Toerbel is also accessible via Bürchen or Zeneggen, but only in the summer and over the Moosalp.

Regular Postbus courses combine Toerbel with Stalden (with connection to the trains to Visp and Zermatt ) and in the summer with the Moosalp ( - Bürchen ).

Attractions

" An authentic and cozy Toerbel " (Walliser German: " Urchigs Terbil ") is an association founded in 1985, Association for the preservation and renovation of ancestral estates in the mountain village Toerbel. The supervised by the association objects include:

• The mill Built: early 19th century, restored: 1984-1985
• S'Chlei Stadelti Built: more than 300 years ago, Refurbished: 1988-1990
• The Bakehouse Built: 1915 Restored: 1988
• The Walke Built: 1830 Refurbished: 1989 to 1991
• The Ignatius Chapel Built: early 19th century, restored: 1991
• The Driel on the Biel ( old wine press ) Built: 1864 Refurbished: 2000 to 2001
• The Polycarp House Built: early 19th century, restored 2003-2004

Stadel

" S'Chlei Stadelti " is the oldest building of the hamlet Zen Blatten and over 300 years old. It is a typical Walliser Stadel how such encounters more frequently in Toerbel. The barn is built on wooden stilts, at the upper end are stone slabs, so that the mice did not enter the interior of the barn. The roof is covered with stone slabs, as it was customary in Toerbel and is still covered in some cottages. Inside the barn various old farming equipment and utensils are to be visited, which were formerly used for farming. Formerly the barn but was mainly used for the storage of grain to the threshing. The grain was grown in the fields, and the extend below the barn to the mill. The grain was tied to " Garpen " and laid out on the field for drying and later housed in several barns until you have threshed it with a wooden flail. Then the corn was thrown by the grain pan and the now clean grain filled in bags and brought to processing in the mill. Today in Toerbel the Stadel obtained are used rather than junk chamber or are empty.

Mill

The mill is situated right next to the Törbjer -Bach. It was thanks to a deal with the open-air museum Ballenberg set repaired, but the open-air museum received the remains of two former mills to build them back in their museum. Before it was in this gorge still 8 mills, a sawmill and a fulling mill. The Walke is thanks to a renovation by " Urchigs Terbil " once again ready for operation. For the sawmill is a renovation planned.

Now to the mill itself: Am Bach is a water slide. When the slider is open, the water is possible on a full- picked tree trunk in the basement of the mill. There the water drives a horizontal water wheel, which is connected to a wooden beam with the millstone on the upper floor. The water then flows through an opening back from the mill and also via a water line back into the creek. On the upper floor, the grain is then thrown into the " Trimja " and the grain is milled to the grindstone. Thereafter, the still impure flour passes through a vibrating screen to remove coarse impurities and then falls into the powder box. The now pure flour is packed in bags and then stored or placed directly into the bakehouse.

Backhaus

The old church back home was built in 1815 and renovated in 1988 by volunteers after they had committed themselves on at the Restaurant White Horn. In the basement is a small hydroelectric power plant, which is however not been used for some years, since near the Moosalp a new power plant was made. Upstairs is the back house with four rooms: The largest room is the bakery, in it, the dough was prepared and shaped the loaves. After the loaves were baked in " Nachhaus ", in which the large oven is. To the left of the bakery bread of small storage room in which the loaves were stored on bread stairs until the customer had picked up the bread. The last room is the open sub-roof, in which the firewood and other commodities were stored.

Human Ecological Studies

In the 1980s Toerbel been the subject of scientific studies by the anthropologist Robert Mcc. Netting and the subsequent economic Nobel Prize winner Elinor Ostrom.

Netting was one of the first who analyzed a municipality according to human ecological aspects. The village community has been studied as an ecosystem that regulates itself through economy, demography, reproductive cycles or marriage behavior.

Ostrom examined the use of Törbeler commons, which was governed by the Statutes of 1483. In particular, she was at the rules for the sustainable use of pastures and forests, and joint maintenance of roads and irrigation channels. After her studies in Toerbel and several other communities around the world Ostrom put forward the theory that common property natural resources in the long run be better managed as a private or public property. The result was Ostrom's main work Governing the Commons.

Personalities

• Viktor Petrig (1887-1973), Grand Council (1913-1949), Grand Council President (1935-1936), the National Council (1917-1943), Government governor (1921-1958), the Council of States (1943-1947)
• Ernst Heinrich Karlen CMM (1922-2012), Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo in Zimbabwe