Published on 7 November 2023

Chasseral - how Switzerland found its own level

The iron surveying pyramid on the Chasseral underlines the importance of the prominent Jura peak for the national survey even today. Although situated at the highest point of the Bernese Jura, the pyramid has spent a humble existence in close proximity to the bulky transmitter since 1979. It is less well known that the marker on the Chasseral has symbolic significance in how “Niveau”, in the sense of topographic level, arrived in Switzerland The German word “Niveau” is primarily used in connection with “education” or “rank”. However, in the context of the 175th anniversary, questions about the “Niveau” of Switzerland may quite rightly be asked, since the expression is also a synonym for “altitude”.