GRISON (Galictis vittata), a carnivorous mammal, of the family Mustelidae, common in Central and South America and It is about the size of a marten, and is bluish grey above and dark brown below. The grison lives on small mammals and birds, and in settled districts is destructive to poultry. Allamand's grison (G. allamandi), with the same range, is larger. The tayra or taira (G. barbara), about as large as an otter, ranges from Mexico to Argentina. It hunts in companies (see CARNIVORA). GRISONS, the most easterly of the Swiss cantons and also the largest in extent, though relatively the most sparsely popu lated. Pop. (1930) 129,721, giving a density per sq.m. of 47. Its area is 2,746 sq.m., of which more than a half is classed as "productive" (forests covering about one fifth of the total), but it has 138.6 sq.m. of glaciers, ranking in this respect next after the Valais and before Bern. The whole canton is mountainous, the principal glacier groups being those of the Todi, N. (11,887 ft.), of Medels, S.W. (10,509 ft.), of the Adula Alps, S.W. (Rhein waldhorn, 11,149 ft.), with the chief source of the Rhine, of the Bernina, S.E. (13,304 ft.), the most extensive, of the Albula, E. (Piz Kesch, 11,228 ft.), and of the Silvretta, N.E. (Piz Linard, 1 1, 201 ft.). The principal valleys are those of the upper Rhine and of the upper Inn (or Engadine, q.v.). The three main sources of the Rhine are in the canton. The valley of the Vorder Rhine is called the Biindner Oberland, that of the Mittel Rhein the Val Medels, and that of the Hinter Rhein (the principal), in different parts of its course, the Rheinwald, the Schams valley and the Domleschg valley, while the upper valley of the Julia is named the Oberhalbstein. Other streams join the Ticino and so the Po, the Adda, and the Adige. The inner valleys are the highest in Central Europe, and among the loftiest villages are Juf, 6,998 ft. (the highest permanently inhabited village in the Alps), at the head of the Avers glen, and St. Moritz, 6,037 ft., in the Upper Engadine. Below Chur, near Malans, good wine is produced, while in the Val Mesocco, etc., maize and chestnuts flourish. Forests and the mountain pasturages are the chief source of wealth. The lower pastures maintain a fine breed of cows. There are many mineral springs. The climate, save on the southern slope of the Alps, is severe. Many strangers visit different spots in the canton, especially Davos (q.v.), Arosa and the Engadine. A railway runs from Maienfeld to Chur (the capital, q.v.), sending off a branch line from Landquart to Davos. From Chur the line bears west to Reichenau whence one branch runs beneath the Albula Pass to St. Moritz, and another up the Vorder Rhine valley to Disentis. There are carriage roads across the passes leading towards Italy.
The German-speaking part of the population live mainly around Chur and Davos, the Italian-speaking in the Val Mesocco, Val Bregaglia and the valley of the Poschiavo. The characteristic tongue of the Grisons is a survival of an ancient Romance language which has a scanty printed literature, but is still widely spoken. It is distinguished into two dialects : the Romonsch which prevails in the BUndner Oberland and in the Hinter Rhein valley, and the Ladin that survives in the Engadine and in the neighbouring valleys of Bergiin, Oberhalbstein and Munster. There are, how ever, in these regions German-speaking people, mostly due to immigration from the Upper Valais in the 13th century. Many of the population are engaged in attending to the wants of tourists, but there is a considerable trade with Italy, particularly in the wines of the Valtellina. Some lead and silver mines were formerly worked, but are now abandoned.
The canton is divided into 14 administrative districts, and includes 224 communes. It sends members to the Federal Stdnderat, and to the Federal Nationalrat. The cantonal constitu tion has created a legislature (Grossrat—no numbers fixed by the constitution) elected by universal suffrage. The "obligatory ref erendum" obtains in the case of all laws and important matters of expenditure and revisions of the constitution.
History.—The greater part (excluding the three Italian speak ing valleys) of the modern canton of the Grisons formed the southern part of the province of Raetia (probably the aboriginal inhabitants, the Raeti, were Celts rather than, as was formally believed, Etruscans), set up by the Romans after their con quest of the region in 15 B.c. The Romanized inhabitants were to a certain extent Teutonized under the Ostrogoths (A.D. and under the Franks (from 537 onwards) . Governors called Praesides are mentioned in the 7th and 8th centuries, while members of the same family occupied the episcopal see of Coire (founded 4th to 5th centuries). About 8o6 Charles the Great made this region into a county, but in 831 the bishop procured for his dominions exemption ("immunity") from the jurisdiction of the counts, while before 847 his see was transferred from the Italian province of Milan to the German province of Mainz (Mayence) and was thus cut off from Italy to be joined to Germany. The bishop became a prince of the empire in 117o and later allied himself with the rising power (in the region) of the Habsburgers. This led in 1367 to the foundation of the League of God's House or the Gotteshausbund, chiefly in order to stem his rising power, the bishop entering it in 1392. In 1395 the abbot of Disentis, the men of the Lugnetz valley, and the great feudal lords of Razuns and Sax, joined in 1399 by the counts or Werdenberg, formed another League, called the Oberbund (as comprising the highlands in the Vorder Rhine valley) and also wrongly the "Grey League" (as the word interpreted "grey" is simply a misreading of graven or counts, though the false view has given rise to the name of Grisons or Graubunden for the whole canton). Finally, in 1436, the third Raetian League was founded by the former subjects of the count of Toggenburg, whose dynasty then became extinct ; they include the inhabitants of the Prattigau, Davos, Maienfeld, the Schanfigg valley, Chur walden, and the lordship of Belfort (i.e., the region round Al vaneu), and formed ten bailiwicks, whence the name of the league—Zehngerichtenbund or League of ten Jurisdictions. In 1450 the Zelingerichtenbund concluded an alliance with the Got teshausbund and in 1471 with the Oberbund; but of the so called perpetual alliance at Vazerol, near Tiefenkastels, there exists no authentic evidence in the oldest chronicles, though diets were held there. In 1496 the possessions of the extinct counts of Toggenburg passed to the elder Habsburgers, the head of whom, Maximilian, was already emperor-elect, and desired to maintain the rights of his family there and in the Lower Engadine. Hence in 1497 the Ober Band and in 1498 the Gotteshausbund became allies of the Swiss Confederation. War broke out in 1499, but was ended by the great Swiss victory (May 22, 1499) at the battle of the Calven gorge (above Mals) which, added to another Swiss victory at Dornach (near Basel), compelled the emperor to recognize the practical independence of the Swiss and their allies of the empire. In 1526, by the Articles of Ilanz, the last re maining traces of the temporal jurisdiction of the bishop of Coire was abolished. In 1512 the three Leagues conquered from Milan the rich and fertile Valtellina, with Bormio and Chiavenna, and held these districts as subject lands till in 1797 they were annexed to the Cisalpine Republic. After the emperor had formally recognized, by the treaty of Westphalia (1648), the independence of the Swiss Confederation, the rights of the Habsburgers in the Prattigau and the Lower Engadine were bought up (1649 and 1652). In 1803, after a brief inclusion in the Helvetic Republic, it entered, under the name of Canton of the Grisons or Grau bunden, the reconstituted Swiss Confederation.