Hérens District

The district of Hérens is a district in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It has a population of (as of ). Except for the municipality of Ayent, which lies on the north bank of the Rhône, the municipalities of Hérens are located in the Val d'Hérens on the south bank of the Rhône. It comprises the following municipalities: After the conquest of Lower Valais by the bishopric of Sion (1476), the Val d’Hérens became subordinate to the reeve of Saint-Maurice. In 1560, it was incorporated into the tithing of Sion, with the exception of Val d'Hérémence, which remained a bailiwick of the Seven Tithings. Hérémence district was formed in 1798 (Helvetic Republic), transformed into its own tithing in the Rhodanic Republic of 1802, and into a canton within the French département du Simplon in 1810. In 1815, it was restored as a tithing (after 1848 called district) within the canton of Valais of the restored Swiss Confederacy, with the addition of Ayent municipality. Arbaz and Savièse were detached from Hérémence under the revised constitution of 1839. The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Azure, on three mounts Vert a Ram passant Argent horned Or between two Mullets Or in chief. On 1 January 2011 the former municipalities of Vernamiège, Nax and Mase merged to form the new municipality of Mont-Noble. The municipality of Les Agettes on 1 January 2017 merged into Sion. Hérens has a population () of . Most of the population () speaks French (8,582 or 95.0%) as their first language, German is the second most common (203 or 2.2%) and Portuguese is the third (100 or 1.1%). There are 40 people who speak Italian and 1 person who speaks Romansh. the gender distribution of the population was 49.3% male and 50.7% female. The population was made up of 4,578 Swiss men (44.7% of the population) and 467 (4.6%) non-Swiss men. There were 4,748 Swiss women (46.4%) and 442 (4.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the district 5,042 or about 55.8% were born in Hérens and lived there in 2000. There were 1,210 or 13.