German Luzern
City (pop., 2000: 59,496), central Switzerland .
Located southwest of Zürich , on Lake Lucerne and its Reuss River outlet, it developed around an 8th-century monastery. It joined the Swiss Confederation in 1332. A stronghold of Catholicism during the Reformation , it later took part in the Sonderbund war. It is a tourist centre, with its medieval walls, towers, and covered bridges. Among its many monuments is the famous Lion of Lucerne , carved in rock, which commemorates the Swiss Guards slain while defending the Tuileries Palace in Paris in 1792.