Seehof (Elay in French) is a municipality in the Jura bernois administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland. It is one of two municipalities with German as its official language in the otherwise French-speaking Bernese Jura (Jura Bernois). The other is Schelten. History Seehof is first mentioned in 1540 as Seehoft. In 1673 it was mentioned as Eslay. Until 1914 the official name was the French name Elay. By 1880 almost the entire population (97%) of the village was German speaking. For most of its history, the village was part of the lands of the provost of Moutier-Grandval under the Prince-Bishop of Basel. During the Protestant Reformation in 1528, Seehof/Elay was part of the Sous-les-Roches region that remained by the old faith. After the 1797 French victory and the Treaty of Campo Formio, Seehof became part of the French Département of Mont-Terrible. Three years later, in 1800 it became part of the Département of Haut-Rhin. After Napoleon's defeat and the Congress of Vienna, Seehof was assigned to the Canton of Bern in 1815. Today it is part of the Catholic parish of Vermes. The Swiss Reformed residents are part of the German speaking parish of Moutier or the parish of Grandval. A village school is first mentioned in 1784. In 1969, the current school building was built. Geography Seehof has an area of . As of 2012, a total of or 33.3% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 63.7% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 2.3% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.6% is either rivers or lakes. During the same year, housing and buildings made up 1.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.8%. Out of the forested land, 59.7% of the total land area is heavily forested and 4.0% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 1.2% is used for growing crops and 18.7% is pastures and 13.2% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. The municipality is located in the Seehof valley. It consists of the village of Seehof and the hamlets of Bächlen, Karlisberg and Stägen. On 31 December 2009 District de Moutier, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Arrondissement administratif Jura bernois. Coat of arms The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Argent