History of our City

In the New Stone Age (ca. 2500 B.C.) there was already a settlement in the area of the city. The name Thun derives from the Celtic word "dunum", which means about the same as ‘fortified hill’. The first documented name for Lake Thun, thus also for Thun, occurred in the 7th century in the chronicles of the  Frankish monk Fredgar. In the Middle Ages a church and a castle stood on the Schlossberg, and there was a settlement on the Aare with a river crossing. Toward the middle of the 12th century the region belong to the Zähringen Rectorate of Burgundy. Before 1200 already the Dukes of Zähringen had built the present-day castle and expanded the city with the Hauptgasse to the Rathausplatz.

When the Zähringen line died out in 1218, the Count of Kyburg from eastern Switzerland inherited the city.  In 1264 Countess Elisabeth von Kyburg issued a handwritten decree to the people of Thun. In it the old rights of the people of Thun were spelled in over a 100 rulings. With two further expansions of the city, the Lower City and the Bälliz, the city covered an expanse that lasted into the 19th century. Disputes over the sovereignty of the House of Kyburg led to fratricide in Schloss Thun in 1322. Count Eberhard, having killed his own brother, was forced to seek help from Bern and in 1323 sold the City of Thun to Bern. He received the City as a fiefdom in return, but still was finally forced to surrender it along with Burgdorf to Bern in 1384. Thun then became a Bernese territorial city and was governed by a Schultheissen from Bern, while retaining its vested rights. In 1476 the people of Thun were awarded a gold star in place of the black star in their coat of arms for their services in the Battle of Murten.

In the 15th and 16th centuries handcrafted goods and business bloomed in Thun. The city became a regional market centre. In the middle of the city a new Rathaus with a shop on the ground floor was constructed and a large marketplace, the Rindermarkt, created in front of it. In 1528 Thun converted to the Reformation.

In the 17th and 18th century the City continued to develop and expand, and the first attempts were made to introduce industry. However, Thun remained only a regional economic centre. Long-distance trade played a secondary role. After French troops marched into the city, Thun became the capital of the existing Canton Oberland for a period from1798 to 1802.

At the beginning of the 19th century a new epoch commenced with the arrival of tourism and the opening of the Federal Military School in 1819. With the construction of hotels and guesthouses and the launching of steamer travel on Lake Thun in 1835 Thun became an important place for tourism. The Military School developed in the course of time into the largest military training area in Switzerland, bringing federal military operations as well to Thun in 1861-63. Further significant events were the opening of the Bern-Thun railway line in 1859, the Gas Works in 1861, the Water Works in 1870, the arrival of the telephone in 1888 and power company in 1896.

In the 20th century there was a significant growth in the population and also a large expansion of city housing. 1913 Thun merged with the community of Goldiwil and in 1920 with Strättligen. Today Thun  has more than 40,000 residents.