Andelfingen

Andelfingen sits on the south bank of the Thur, at 370 metres, between Schaffhausen and Winterthur, at the centre of the district of which it is the capital — a district also called the Weinland, the wine country. The old centre holds to a few streets: a castle built in 1780-1782 with its outbuildings, the former chancellery of 1697, the Löwen inn whose oldest parts go back to the sixteenth century. The castle park, laid out in the nineteenth century, is open to the public; the building itself, which housed a retirement home until 1999, now serves as flats and offices.

Everything here turns on the river crossing. Andelfingen was one of the few points where the Thur could be crossed, a natural barrier if ever there was one; the bridge, already widened in 1324, had made the town a place of toll and regional trade. Destroyed by war in 1799, it was replaced in 1814-1815 by a covered wooden bridge, the work of Hans Konrad Stadler, which still leads to Kleinandelfingen on the far bank. The same position earned the site, during the Second World War, a defensive barrier position meant to reinforce the natural obstacle.

The Reformed church sums up on its own the layering of the place. Remains of walls beneath the present building suggest a settlement in the eighth century; a church is recorded in 1260, and its nave was rebuilt in 1666-1667. In 1861-1862 Johann Caspar Wolff raised the neo-Gothic tower that now marks it from far off, above the roofs of the town.

Why this place is remarkable

Andelfingen owes its existence to a constraint of terrain: the Thur is hard to cross, and the town holds one of the few crossings. Everything that followed comes from that — a medieval toll that became a district capital, a covered wooden bridge of 1814-1815 still in service, and, for the same geographical reason, a defensive barrier position dug during the Second World War at the exact point where the river stops being an obstacle.

History and origin

The ground has yielded Neolithic stone axes and Bronze Age pottery. In 1911 the discovery of two richly furnished graves led to the excavation of a cemetery of 29 burials, assigned to the fourth and third centuries BC. The name appears in 1248, in the form Andelfingon. The castle belonged to the sons of Emperor Albert, who pledged it to the lords of Landenberg; in 1434 they sold Andelfingen to Zurich. The town was officially called Grossandelfingen until 1970. On 1 January 2023 the neighbouring municipalities of Adlikon and Humlikon joined it.