Widen

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Widen

Canton	Aargau
District	Bremgarten (district)
Coordinates	47°22′N 8°22′E
Population	3630 (December 2004)
Area	2.62 km²
Elevation	381 m
Postal code	8967
Mayor	Vreni Meuwly (2006 FDP)
Website	www.widen.ch
Widen

Widen is a municipality in the district of Bremgarten in the canton of Aargau in Switzerland.

[edit] Geography

The village center is situated on a little plateau between the Mutschellen in the south and the Hasenberg in the north, of which the latter is the southernmost part of the Heitersberg. In the west the plateau goes down to the Reuss.

Widen has grown together with some of its neighbour villages Berikon, Rudolfstetten-Friedlisberg and Zufikon. Of the total area (260 hectares) 44 hectares are forest and 98 are built upon. The highest point of the village lies on the Hasenberg at 740 meters, the lowest point at 430 meters near Eggenwil.

Neighbour villages are Bellikon in the north, Bergdietikon in the north-east, Rudolfstetten-Fridlisberg in the east, Berikon in the south-east, Zufikon in the south and Eggenwil in the west.

[edit] History

At the end of the 12th century a manor called "Wyda" is mentioned the first time, there's no exact year. "Widen", in the way like it's written today, appears the first time during the 14th century.

In medieval times, the manor belonged to Habsburg. 1415 the Eidgenossen conquered the Aargau and Widen then belonged to the Grafschaft Baden. In March 1798 the French conquered Switzerland and proclamated the Helvetic Republic, in which Widen and Eggenwil formed one single municipality in the short-dated canton of Baden. After the foundation of the canton of Aargau 1803, Widen and Eggenwil were separated. Up to that time, there's not much known about Widen, because there are almost no documents left.

During the 19th century Widen stayed a small village. Lots of poor inhabitants had to leave their home and emigrated. The given up farms were freshly occupied by people from the canton of Bern, which were protestant. That's why today, compared to its merely catholic neighbour villages, Widen has a relatively high percentage of protestant inhabitants.

On the 1 May 1902 the Bremgarten-Dietikon-Bahn was founded and Widen was connected to the railway network, by a station on the Mutschellen pass. During the first half of the 20th century Widen stayed small. However, from 1950 to 1990 the population began to grow very fast, 1990 3915 people lived in Widen. The population then sank slightly and now it stays constantly at about 3600 people.