Colombier (French pronunciation: [kɔlɔ̃bje] ⓘ) is a former municipality in the Boudry District in the canton of Neuchâtel in Switzerland.

One of the largest Roman era villas in Switzerland was excavated from under the castle in 1840–42 by Frédéric Dubois de Montperreux.

It was built in multiple stages between the 1st and 3rd centuries AD into a palatial mansion with a peristyle, at least two baths with mosaics and frescoes and terraced gardens.

In 1488 the Colombier lands were acquired by marriage by the de Chauvirey family of Franche-Comté.

Under Johann Jakob von Watteville, the Protestant Reformation was successfully introduced in town.

When portions of the Armée de l'Est were interred in Colombier in 1871, the Catholic mass began to be read once again in the church.

In 1357 it received, along with Bôle and Areuse, a forest which the three municipalities jointly managed until the 18th century.

In the middle of the 17th century, the town was saved from bankruptcy through a loan given by the bankers Abraham Mouchet and his son.

Henri II d'Orléans, the Prince of Neuchatel, freed the municipality from its debts in 1657.

In exchange, the municipality pledged to plant trees along the road from the lake to the castle.

[3] In 1734, the first spinning factory in the Lower Areuse was built in Colombier by Jean-Jacques Deluz Bied.

The factory brought a degree of prosperity and enabled the construction stately country houses in the vicinity of the village (Le Bied, Vaudijon, La Mairesse, Cottendart, Sombacour).

Starting in 1824, it was used by the Federal militias as a parade ground and was converted into a barracks and given an expanded arsenal.

In 2003, the Army XXI reforms dissolved the Division and in 2004 the barracks became an infantry training center.

The regional secondary school was built in the 1969 and teaches students from Colombier, Cortaillod, Boudry, Bôle, Rochefort and Auvernier.

[4] The former municipality is located in the Boudry district, on a small hill above Lake Neuchâtel.

The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Gules two Doves passant standing on a Cross Argent throughout.

[8] Most of the population (as of 2000[update]) speaks French (4,229 or 86.4%) as their first language, German is the second most common (220 or 4.5%) and Italian is the third (132 or 2.7%).

The entire urban village of Colombier and the Areuse region are part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites.

In the tertiary sector; 224 or 21.0% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 42 or 3.9% were in the movement and storage of goods, 69 or 6.5% were in a hotel or restaurant, 10 or 0.9% were in the information industry, 13 or 1.2% were the insurance or financial industry, 71 or 6.7% were technical professionals or scientists, 168 or 15.7% were in education and 119 or 11.2% were in health care.

[8] From the 2000 census[update], 1,682 or 34.3% were Roman Catholic, while 1,852 or 37.8% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church.