Thun

Thun stands where the Aare leaves Lake Thun, at the entrance to the Bernese Oberland. Its castle rises above the town: the great keep was built under the dukes of Zähringen around 1190. The counts of Kyburg succeeded them, and after the Burgdorf War Thun passed definitively to Bern in 1384.

Bernese governors resided in the castle, while the town retained considerable control over its own affairs. Thun's three annual fairs, including cattle trading, made it an important regional market. The town hall, church, hospital and granary were prominent buildings in its streets. The French invasion and the Helvetic Republic ended the old Bernese order in 1798, when Thun became the capital of the short-lived canton of Oberland.