Canton of Glarus

The canton of Glarus is a canton in east-central Switzerland, and its capital is the town of Glarus. The canton is dominated by the deep valley of the Linth River and the smaller Sernftal to the east, and most of its 685 square kilometres is mountainous; the highest peak in the Glarus Alps is the Tödi at 3,614 metres, and part of a thrust fault in the canton was declared the UNESCO World Heritage Site Swiss Tectonic Arena Sardona in 2008. Glarus joined the Old Swiss Confederacy in 1352 as one of the eight foundational cantons, the first recorded Landsgemeinde took place in 1387, and the Habsburg attempt to reconquer the valley was repelled at the Battle of Näfels in 1388. The County of Werdenberg was annexed in 1517, and between 1798 and 1803 the territory formed part of the Napoleonic canton of Linth. On 6 May 2007 Glarus became the first Swiss canton to lower the voting age to 16, and the 25 municipalities of the canton were consolidated into three on 1 January 2011. The population speaks a variety of Alemannic German.