During the Middle Ages, Wil Castle was built near the village and it became the seat of the Herrschaft of Schlosswil. The lords of the fort, the Freiherren von Wiler, were first mentioned in 1146. The von Wiler family died out around 1300, and the village and associated territory passed through several noble families, including the Freiherren von Signau and eventually the Senn von Münsingen family. The territory was split in half and passed through several Bernese patrician families until Burkhard von Erlach reunited the two halves in 1514.
In 1546 the medieval castle was destroyed in a fire. Shortly thereafter it was rebuilt as a larger castle under the direction of the master builder Niklaus von Wattenwyl-May. The current appearance comes from a 1780 renovation that gave the castle a Baroque exterior.
Following the 1798 French invasion, under the Helvetic Republic the nobility lost much of their power and property and by 1812 the castle was acquired by the Canton of Bern. In 1818 the castle tower became the only granary for the district of Konolfingen. A famine in 1816-17 was partly alleviated by the grain at the castle. In 1847 the tower was converted into a prison, a role that it filled until 1881. Even after the prison closed, the castle continued to be used by the district administration and courts. In 2010 the District of Konolfingen was dissolved and the need for district offices vanished. In 2011 it was acquired by Matthias Steinmann, who founded the Steinmann Foundation to operate the castle.
The original fortress tower was built in first half of the 12th century for the von Wiler family. The walls of the square tower are 38 meters tall and to the peak of the roof is 43.5 meters.
References:The Château du Lude is one of the many great châteaux of the Loire Valley in France. Le Lude is the most northerly château of the Loire Valley and one of the last important historic castles in France, still inhabited by the same family for the last 260 years. The château is testimony to four centuries of French architecture, as a stronghold transformed into an elegant house during the Renaissance and the 18th century. The monument is located in the valley of Le Loir. Its gardens have evolved throughout the centuries.