Limes on Walensee Raetia
This defense line along the Walensee comprises a series of fortified towers to protect the route from Italy to the Rhine on the stretch between the upper Rhine valley in Raetia and the E end of Lake Zurich. Most of the towers were built in 20-15 B.C. (dated by pottery and weapons), during the early Augustan campaigns which eventually led to the establishment of the provincia Raetia et Vindelici et vallis Poenina. They also protected the S flank of an army approaching Lake Constance via Basilia and Vitudurum. The towers were abandoned ca. A.D. 10.
Three of the seven towers have been excavated. They lie on both sides of the Walensee and in the plain between it and Lake Zurich, either on elevations or on the lake shore. They are spaced 3-6 km apart so that signaling was possible. The towers were built against the wall of an irregular court (area ca. 400 sq. m). They were square (9-13 m to a side) and two or three stories high, the lower 5-6 m of stone, with wood and stone above. The foundations have five or six steps (width at the bottom 2.5 m). There were windows 0.3 m wide, and an entrance from a wooden sentry walk at the level of the second floor. Three towers may be visited: 1) Voremwald, 1 km W of Filzbach, at the top of the Kerenzerberg pass, on the S side of the lake; 2) Stralegg, near Betlis, on the N shore of the lake; 3) Biberlikopf, near Ziegelbrücke, on a spur of the Schänerberg.
The Museum des Landes Glarus is in Näfels, and the Neues Museum in St. Gallen.
BIBLIOGRAPHYUr-Schweiz 24 (1960) 3-24, 51-67, 67-711PI; Jb. Schweiz. Gesell. f. Urgeschichte 48 (1960-61) 151-60; 49 (1962) 53-56PI; 53 (1966-67) 151-56PI; 54 (1968-69) 78-79; E. Meyer, “Die geschichtlichen Nachrichten über die Räter und ihre Wohnsitze,” ibid. 55 (1970) 119-25; C. M. Wells, The German Policy of Augustus (1972) 54-55.
V. VON GONZENBACH