By the beginning of the 13th century Zürich’s traders had created a vast amount of wealth, mainly from textiles such as wool and silk. Two monasteries in Zurich, the Grossmünster, and particularly the Fraumünster, maintained considerable influence over the city. The official governing body was the aristocratic council, made up of one third nobility and two thirds the city's patriciate, mainly merchants. But it was the abbess of the Fraumünster that appointed the mayor from among the council.
The year 1336 was a year for both a massive expansion of the monastery land, mostly as vineyards, and the year that the presiding mayor, Rudolf Brun, decided that the existing power structure in Zurich was not a tenable situation, and in a subtle political ploy, started a revolution. Ok, let's call it an aggressive rebalancing of power.
Brun had the backing of the city’s craftsmen, the trade guilds, and one of the various meeting places was the court of the Barefoot Monastery. No separation of church and state here, but then ask an alter boy; those darned monks can’t resist keeping their noses out of a lot of things.
In 1337 Brun defeated his opponents, shuffling power into the hands of the workers’ guilds, but reserving the title of “mayor for life” for himself. He dominated the council until his death in 1360*. The guilds in turn exerted political influence from the end of the 14th century right up to the French Revolution. You can still see the evidence of all the guild halls around Zurich, and a good thing too, because many of them are mighty fine restaurants.
Brun's “revolution” also decreased the influence of the two monasteries, however the Fraumünster abbess, a position traditionally for women of the highest nobility, did retain political influence until the Reformation in the 1520.
* Under Rudolf Brun, Zürich joined the Swiss Confederation in 1351.
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