ncil. However in 1459 the last noble family died out and positions on the council fell to wealthy farmers, butchers and millers.
Until the pogrom on 1348 during an outbreak of the plague, there was a small Jewish community in Solothurn.
Over the 13th to 15th centuries, the citizens of the city slowly emancipated themselves from the higher nobility. In 1276 and 1280 Emperor Rudolf I codified the previously poorly defined rights of the city and granted it the privilege de non Evocando or the right that their citizens were protected from trial in foreign courts. In 1344 Solothurn acquired the right to appoint their own Schultheiss from the Count of Buchegg, which was confirmed by Emperor Charles IV in 1360. In 1409, Emperor Ruprecht extended the de non Evocando privilege to include the royal High Court as well.
As the city grew in power, it bound the Monastery of St. Ursus more closely to the city. In 1251 the city defeated claims made by the Monastery on the right to appoint the Schultheiss. Shortly after the acquisition of the right to the Schultheiss office in 1344, the city came into possession of the vogt right over the Monastery by granting citizenship rights to the former vogt (bailiff), Burkhard Senn the Elder. In 1512-20 the city received the right to appoint canons and provosts from the Pope.
After the alliance with Bern in 1295, it became part of the Swiss Confederation. In 1382 the Habsburgs attacked the city, involving Solothurn in the Battle of Sempach. By the treaty of two years later, the Habsburgs renounced all claims to the territory of the city. The latter was expanded by acquisition of neighbouring lands in the 15th century, roughly up to the today's canton area.
In 1481, it obtained full membership in the Swiss Confederation.
From 1530 to 1792 it was the seat of the French ambassador to Switzerland.
Buildings in the medieval city
Before 1200 there was a Z�hringer fortified tower north
