Editing Metrication (section)

=== Switzerland (1801–1877)===
[[File:Guillaume-Henri Dufour.jpg|left|thumb|upright=0.75|Guillaume Henri Dufour, founder of [[Swisstopo]]]]
[[File:Heinrich Wild.jpg|thumb|upright=0.75|Heinrich von Wild, president of the [[International Meteorological Organization]] and member of the [[General Conference on Weights and Measures|International Committee for Weights and Measures]]]]
In 1801, the [[Helvetic Republic]] at the instigation of [[Johann Georg Tralles]] promulgated a law introducing the metric system. However this was never applied, because in 1803 the competence for weights and measures returned to the [[Cantons of Switzerland|cantons]]. On the territory of the current [[canton of Jura]], then annexed to France ([[Mont-Terrible]]), the metre was adopted in 1800. The [[Canton of Geneva]] adopted the metric system in 1813, the [[canton of Vaud]] in 1822, the [[canton of Valais]] in 1824 and the [[canton of Neuchâtel]] in 1857. In 1835, twelve cantons of the [[Swiss Plateau]] and the north-east adopted a concordat based on the federal foot (exactly 0.3 m) which entered into force in 1836. The cantons of [[Central Switzerland|central]] and [[eastern Switzerland]], as well as the Alpine cantons, continued to use the old measures.<ref name=":5">{{Cite web|title=Système métrique|url=https://hls-dhs-dss.ch/articles/013754/2014-05-22/|access-date=8 January 2021|website=hls-dhs-dss.ch|language=fr|archive-date=10 January 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210110034838/https://hls-dhs-dss.ch/articles/013754/2014-05-22/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Journal de Genève - 22.03.1854 - Page 1|url=https://www.letempsarchives.ch/page/JDG_1854_03_22/1/article/5203313|access-date=24 February 2021|website=www.letempsarchives.ch|archive-date=7 November 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231107040659/https://www.letempsarchives.ch/page/JDG_1854_03_22/1/article/5203313|url-status=live}}</ref>

[[Guillaume Henri Dufour|Guillaume-Henri Dufour]] founded in 1838 in [[Geneva]] a topographic office (the future [[Swisstopo|Federal Office of topography]]), which published under his direction, from 1845 to 1864, the first official [[Topographic Map of Switzerland|map of Switzerland]], on the basis of new cantonal measurements. This map at [[Scale (map)|1:100,000]] engraved on copper, suggested the relief by hatching and shadows. The map projection adopted by the commission was the [[Bonne projection]], centred on the [[Bern]] Observatory (5° 6<nowiki>' 10.8''</nowiki> east of [[Paris meridian]]), although this point was much closer to the western end of Switzerland than to its eastern end. But its position was well known, and there was no more central [[observatory]]. The scale was set at 1:100 000 because it was considered more suitable for a country as rugged as Switzerland than the 1:80 000 adopted for the large [[Geography of France|map of France]] and the two maps were in any case inconsistent, as the meridians of the [[Cartography of Switzerland|map of Switzerland]] tilted in the opposite direction to those of the map of France. The map commission wanted to adopt decimal measures; and Switzerland did not have an already existing map which, like the [[Cassini map]], used a scale close to 1:86 400, i.e. 1 [[line (unit)|line]] ({{frac|1|12}} of a French inch) to 100 [[toise]]s (i.e. 600 French feet). The [[metre]] was adopted as a linear measure, and the entire map was divided into twenty-five sheets: five east–west and five north–south. Each sheet of the map showed two scales, one purely [[Metric system|metric]], the other in Swiss [[League (unit)|leagues]] 4800 metres in length. The frame was divided into [[Degree (angle)|sexagesimal]] [[Minute and second of arc|minutes]] and centesimal minutes; the latter, each subdivided into ten parts, had the advantage of showing [[Kilometre]]s in the direction of the [[Meridian (geography)|meridians]]; so that there were new scales on the sides of the sheet to evaluate the distances.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web|title=Cartographie|url=https://hls-dhs-dss.ch/articles/008258/2014-11-26/|access-date=12 March 2021|website=hls-dhs-dss.ch|language=fr|archive-date=2 February 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210202081004/https://hls-dhs-dss.ch/articles/008258/2014-11-26/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":7">{{cite journal |last1=Dufour |first1=G.-H. |title=Notice sur la carte de la Suisse dressée par l'État Major Fédéral |journal=Le Globe. Revue genevoise de géographie |date=1861 |volume=2 |issue=1 |pages=5–22 |doi=10.3406/globe.1861.7582}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Systèmes de référence historiques|url=https://www.swisstopo.admin.ch/fr/connaissances-faits/histoire-collections/cartes-historiques/references-historiques.html|access-date=12 March 2021|website=Office fédéral de topographie swisstopo|language=fr|archive-date=26 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201126212909/https://www.swisstopo.admin.ch/fr/connaissances-faits/histoire-collections/cartes-historiques/references-historiques.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>

According to the [[Swiss Federal Constitution|1848 Constitution]] the federal foot was to come into force throughout the country. In [[Geneva]], a committee chaired by [[Guillaume Henri Dufour]] militated in favor of maintaining the decimal metric system in the French-speaking cantons and against the standardization of weights and measures in Switzerland on the basis of the metric foot. In 1868 the metric system was legalized alongside the federal foot, which was a first step towards its definitive introduction. Cantonal calibrators were supervised by a [[Federal Institute of Metrology|Federal Bureau of Verification]] created in 1862, whose management was entrusted to [[Heinrich von Wild]] from 1864. In 1875, the responsibility for weights and measures was transferred back from the cantons to the Confederation, and [[Switzerland]] (represented by [[Adolphe Hirsch]]) joined the [[Metre Convention]]. The same year a federal law imposed the metric system from 1 January 1877. In 1977, Switzerland joined the [[International System of Units]].<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":4" /><ref>{{Cite web|title=Hirsch, Adolphe|url=https://hls-dhs-dss.ch/articles/032026/2005-05-10/|access-date=8 January 2021|website=hls-dhs-dss.ch|language=fr|archive-date=24 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201124232607/https://hls-dhs-dss.ch/articles/032026/2005-05-10/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Journal de Genève - 22.03.1854 - Page 1|url=https://www.letempsarchives.ch/page/JDG_1854_03_22/1/article/5203313|access-date=12 March 2021|website=www.letempsarchives.ch|archive-date=7 November 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231107040659/https://www.letempsarchives.ch/page/JDG_1854_03_22/1/article/5203313|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Journal de Genève - 14.02.1852 - Page 4|url=https://www.letempsarchives.ch/page/JDG_1852_02_14/4|access-date=12 March 2021|website=www.letempsarchives.ch|archive-date=7 November 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231107040705/https://www.letempsarchives.ch/page/JDG_1852_02_14/4|url-status=live}}</ref>