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Ayas

1.680 meters

Palenc Palénc

Les Fusines Li Fejeune – 1.700 m
Blanchard Biantchart – 1.724 m
Rovinal Rovénal – 1.709 m
Praz-Sec Pra-Sec – 1.700 m
Les Péyoz Li Péyo – 1.725 m
Les Droles Li Drole – 1.757 m
Bernosin Bernozìn – 1.750 m

Palenc (Palénc in patois), together with Palouettaz and Magnéaz, is one of the Traversa villages situated halfway up the slope, surrounded by green pastures and overlooked at short distance by a band of conifer forests.

At the entrance stands the Chapel of the Holy Cross, built in 1842.

Shortly after the fountain opens the small square from which Rue de la Vardaz can be accessed on the left and Rue Borbon on the right, a narrow lane running parallel to the regional road below.

Walking along Rue Borbon, one notices a house with two conical stone columns on the façade supporting the projecting section, according to a model typical of prestigious residences.

Further on, a series of balconies projects from ancient rascards with masonry bases and wooden upper sections resting on mushroom-shaped pillars. On numerous beams, the “millesimi” (merejeumo in the Ayas patois), namely the construction dates carved into the wood (1555, 1573, 1765, 1768, 1777), are still preserved, a custom that spread from the 16th century onward.

Palenc too had a communal oven for baking bread.

Map of Palenc

Chapel of the Holy Cross

In his 1889 text Mémoire de la Paroisse d’Ayas, Reverend August Clos recalls that the chapel had the privilege of possessing a fragment of the True Cross set into a reliquary cross. It was a gift that Monsignor Jean-Jacques Duc (1705–1762), one of the three provosts who governed the affairs of the Aosta Valley Church from 1727 to 1802, wished to present to his fellow student, Canon Brunod of Palenc, who in turn donated it to the chapel of his village.

 
 
 
IMG_4837 PALENC cappella 1a

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