republic constituting the greater part of Switzerland, founded on March 29, 1798, after the country had been conquered by Revolutionary France. The new republic excluded both Geneva, which was annexed to France (April 1798), and the three provinces of Valtellina, Chiavenna, and Bormio, which went to the Italian Cisalpine Republic. In 1802 Austrian Frickthal was added to the republic, and Valais was detached and made into an independent republic (later, in 1810, annexed to France). The Helvetic Republic was recognized in the Franco-Austrian Treaty of Lunéville (1801).

The government was patterned after that of the Directory in France. So many factional disputes arose that delegates from the republic called on Napoleon Bonaparte (Napoleon I) to mediate. He promptly dictated the Act of Mediation (Sept. 30, 1802; amplified on Feb. 19, 1803), which substituted a new Swiss Confederation for the Helvetic Republic, forcing it into close association with France.