Facing the Gran Paradiso, at the edge of the village, lie the Prati di Sant'Orso: the town statute forbids building on them, and meadow they have stayed. The bataille de reines is fought there. It is the decision that explains Cogne better than any other: the largest comune in the Aosta Valley chose to keep its empty space.
Little rain falls up here: the average over the last thirty years is 638 millimetres, against roughly 1,500 for Italy as a whole. But when it rains it does damage: on the night of 29 June 2024 a flood cut the village off from its own hamlets. Since the Middle Ages the 1,453 residents have also lived off the magnetite deposit, granted to the valley people by the local lords; the name first appears in 1151, spelled Conia.
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📅 Every year, on 1 February
Cogne's patron is Saint Ursus, on 1 February; and on the meadows that bear his name, on 29 September, the Désarpa ends, when the herds come down from the high pastures.
Straight-line distances from the town centre. Tap a point to open its page.
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
Outside Cogne, but an easy day trip away.
