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Berthold V, Duke of Zahringen, founded Bern in 1191 on a peninsula formed by a wide loop of the Aare River. The natural moat the river created made it defensible; the ridge top it stood on made it visible for miles. Whether Berthold really named it after a bear he killed on a hunting trip is a question historians enjoy arguing about, but bears have been the city's symbol since at least the sixteenth century, and four live bears occupy a riverside enclosure at the Nydeggbrucke to this day.

The medieval city that grew from that founding is almost entirely intact, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1983.

Six kilometres of arcaded walkways run through the old town, creating covered pavements that locals call Lauben, making Bern arguably the world's most pleasant city to be in during rain. The Zytglogge, a clock tower from the early thirteenth century, performs an elaborate mechanical puppet show four minutes before every hour, watched by a permanent cluster of people who have been stopping to watch it for eight hundred years. The Federal Palace, built between 1857 and 1902, houses the Swiss parliament and government. Bern has been the country's federal city since 1848, though the Swiss carefully avoid calling it a capital.