, the town's namesake, depicted by
Matthias Grünewald, 15th century. Saint-Maurice is first mentioned in 200 as
Acaun[ensis] [quadragesimae] Gal[liarum]. In respect to
Saint Maurice, the name was changed from
Acaunum () to Saint-Maurice in 1003. In the 13th century the town was surrounded by walls. Count Amadeus V of Savoy confirmed the city charter in 1317, at which time the town had a population of between 1,400 and 1,800. In 1475 the Lower Valais was ruled by the
Seven Zenden as an associate member (Zugewandter Ort) of the
Swiss Confederation. From 1475 until 1798, Saint-Maurice was the capital of the Saint-Maurice province. In the following year, 1476,
Bern began construction of a castle in the narrow Rhone valley at Saint-Maurice. It was completed in 1646 with the expansion of the residential buildings. However, in 1693 a devastating fire in the town, destroyed the warehouse of the castle and much of the
gunpowder that was stored there. During the
Helvetic Republic Saint-Maurice was a District capital. After the
Act of Mediation ended the Republic, from 1802 to 1804 it was a Zenden capital and in 1810-14 it was the capital of a sub-prefecture of the
French department of the Simplon. In 1822 the towns of Vérossaz and Evionnaz separated from the municipality. of Saint-Maurice Abbey The most important religious institution in town was the abbey, but several other religious communities were established in Saint-Maurice. These communities included; in 1611 the
Capuchins, in 1865 the Sisters of Saint-Maurice, in 1906 the
Augustinian Sisters and in 1996 the Brotherhood of the
Eucharist in Epinassey. The Capuchin monastery's chapel was built in 1640. The church of Saint-Sigismond has been the
parish church since at least the mid-12th century. It was built on the site of the 6th- or 7th-century St. John's burial church. The present church building dates of 1715. The still standing Hospice of Saint-Jacques was built in the 10th century. Until the
Reformation in 1529, Morcles belonged to the parish of Saint-Maurice and the church of Notre Dame-sous-le-Bourg was the
parish church for
Lavey. In 1693 Notre Dame-sous-le-Bourg was destroyed in a fire and by 1721 only the ruins of the walls still remained. The chapel of Saint-Laurent was first mentioned in 1178 and was abandoned in the 19th century. The church of Notre-Dame-du-Scex was built in the 18th century, on the remains of an 8th-century building. The Martyrs Chapel in Vérolliez was rebuilt to its present appearance in the 18th century. The chapel in Epinassey was established in 1923. The Abbey College, was first mentioned in the
Middle Ages. In 1806, support of the school was taken over by the canton and it became the
Collège de Saint-Maurice. The narrow canyon at Saint-Maurice facilitated both trade and defense. The bridge over the Rhone was built around the 12th century and was the first bridge upstream of
Lake Geneva after the Roman bridge of Massongex (2 km downstream Saint-Maurice). The fortifications in the canyon was gradually expanded in 1831, 1848, 1859 and finally in 1892. During the Second World War, the fortifications at Saint-Maurice were one of the three main pillars of the
National Redoubt. In 1995, the fortifications were abandoned and opened as a tourist attraction. Following the army reforms of Armee 95 and XXI, the former mountain infantry military base of Saint-Maurice-Lavey has served as a training camp for the military police. A large rail yard was built in the municipality following the construction of a railway in 1860, now part of the
Simplon Railway. Between 1898 and 1940, the power plant Bois Noir, supplied the city of Lausanne with electricity. However, the municipality was not industrialized until much later. The first major industrial plant was a cement factory that was in operation from the 1950s until 1986. In 1934 the Saint-Augustin printing house opened in town. The newspaper "valaisan Nouvelliste" (New Valais) was founded in 1903 in Saint-Maurice. It was renamed the "Feuille d'Avis Nouvelliste et du Valais" in 1968. The "Echos de Saint-Maurice" was first published in 1899, and in 2000 became the "Nouvelles de l'Abbaye". The "La Patrie Valaisanne" was published between 1927 and 1969. It then became the
CVP party newspaper under the title "Valais Demain" until it closed in 1997. The abbey building, its treasure, and the
Feengrotte which opened in 1863, attract pilgrims and tourists. The Saint-Amé clinic was founded in 1901 and was rebuilt in 1996 into the Lower Valais geriatrics center. The city is home to a branch of the Mediathek Wallis (the library of Wallis), which was formerly the Lower Valais branch of the Cantonal Library. The Educators' School of Wallis (Pädagogic Hochschule Wallis) is located in the municipality. The new zoning plan of 1996 provides for the development of Saint-Maurice at the exit of the
A9 motorway. In 2008, the eleven-member town council had six members of the
CVP, four
FDP.The Liberals and one representative of the
Alliance de gauche. The thirty-member General Council had 15 members from the CVP, 11 from the FDP. The Liberals and four from the
Alliance de gauche. The
citizen's council is managed by a six-member committee, which oversee extensive property, including the campsite Bois Noir, pastures and forests. ==Geography==