After the conquest of Lower Valais by the bishopric of Sion, 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, transformed into its own tithing in the Rhodanic Republic of 1802, and into a canton within the Frenchdépartement du Simplon in 1810. In 1815, it was restored as a tithing 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.
Demographics
Hérens has a population of. Most of the population speaks French as their first language, German is the second most common and Portuguese is the third. 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 and 467 non-Swiss men. There were 4,748 Swiss women and 442 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 13.4% who were born in the same canton, while 781 or 8.6% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 707 or 7.8% were born outside of Switzerland. , there were 3,544 people who were single and never married in the district. There were 4,616 married individuals, 625 widows or widowers and 244 individuals who are divorced. There were 1,031 households that consist of only one person and 265 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 3,703 households that answered this question, 27.8% were households made up of just one person and there were 80 adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 1,014 married couples without children, 1,189 married couples with children There were 161 single parents with a child or children. There were 66 households that were made up of unrelated people and 162 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing. The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray id:darkgrey value:gray ImageSize = width:960 height:210 PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:9300 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:1900 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:380 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark: align:center bar:1850 from:start till:5862 text:"5,862" bar:1860 from:start till:6003 text:"6,003" bar:1870 from:start till:6267 text:"6,267" bar:1880 from:start till:6578 text:"6,578" bar:1888 from:start till:6521 text:"6,521" bar:1900 from:start till:6943 text:"6,943" bar:1910 from:start till:7439 text:"7,439" bar:1920 from:start till:7709 text:"7,709" bar:1930 from:start till:8341 text:"8,341" bar:1941 from:start till:8593 text:"8,593" bar:1950 from:start till:8680 text:"8,680" bar:1960 from:start till:9229 text:"9,229" bar:1970 from:start till:8466 text:"8,466" bar:1980 from:start till:8168 text:"8,168" bar:1990 from:start till:8515 text:"8,515" bar:2000 from:start till:9029 text:"9,029"
Politics
In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 47.67% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP, the SVP and the FDP. In the federal election, a total of 5,651 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 71.8%. In the 2009 Conseil d'Etat/Staatsrat election a total of 5,035 votes were cast, of which 245 or about 4.9% were invalid. The voter participation was 65.0%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election a total of 5,571 votes were cast, of which 285 or about 5.1% were invalid. The voter participation was 72.4%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 59.88%.
Religion
From the, 7,939 or 87.9% were Roman Catholic, while 363 or 4.0% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church. Of the rest of the population, there were 23 members of an Orthodox church, there was 1 individual who belongs to the Christian Catholic Church, and there were 34 individuals who belonged to another Christian church. There were 3 individuals who were Jewish, and 15 who were Islamic. There were 4 individuals who were Buddhist, 1 person who was Hindu and 5 individuals who belonged to another church. 313 belonged to no church, are agnostic or atheist, and 339 individuals did not answer the question.
Education
In Hérens about 2,559 or of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 710 or have completed additional higher education. Of the 710 who completed tertiary schooling, 58.3% were Swiss men, 28.0% were Swiss women, 6.8% were non-Swiss men and 6.9% were non-Swiss women.
