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Villages / Valais / Westlich Raron district / Ried

Ried

Lost village Canton of Valais · District: Westlich Raron · Hamlet destroyed in 2025 (34 inhabitants in 1888). The municipality of Blatten has 291 inhabitants (31.12.2025, provisional FSO figure)
Part of the municipality of Blatten
Origin of the name Founding Historical timeline Population over time Legends Sources and references Nearby villages

Origin of the name Ried

Ried is a very common place name. Here it refers to a hamlet of Blatten below Weissenried and out of its sight. Its meaning here remains unexplained.[2]

Founding of Ried

Ried was a hamlet in the municipality of Blatten, at 1'509 metres. With Eisten and Weissenried it formed the hamlets attached to the village of Blatten, the highest municipality in the Lötschental. Tourism came early: the valley's first hotel was built here. A steep footpath linked it to Weissenried. The federal inventory of heritage sites listed it as a hamlet of regional importance.[1][2][3]

History of Ried

mid-18th century. Ried joins the burgher community of Blatten together with Weissenried.[2]

1868. The first hotel of the Lötschental is built at Ried.[2]

around 1906. Death of Peter Siegen of Ried, friend and trusted contact of Edmund von Fellenberg, one of the best connoisseurs of the Lötschental.[3]

1907. The simple inn at Ried no longer meets demand.[3]

2025. On 28 May a gigantic avalanche of ice, mud and rock from a glacier collapse buries most of the village of Blatten and the hamlet of Ried, which is completely destroyed.[4]

2025. On 7 November the canton's new hazard map rules out any rebuilding of the hamlet.[5]

Population of Ried

Sources and references: [3][6]

Population of Ried
188834 (5 houses, 7 households)

Legends of Ried

The people of the Winterbletschu. According to legend, people once lived in the Winterbletschu near Ried, as in other now empty places at the head of the valley, the Uiflengu, the Wüstenmatten or the Grindorf.[3]

Sources

  1. Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (version allemande originale), « Blatten (VS) » (Werner Bellwald, version du 02.06.2004)
  2. Inventaire fédéral des sites construits à protéger en Suisse (ISOS), « Weissenried » (3e version, septembre 1996)
  3. F. G. Stebler, « Am Lötschberg. Land und Volk von Lötschen », Monographien aus den Schweizeralpen, Zurich, Albert Müller, 1907 (RERO DOC)
  4. SRF, « Die Naturkatastrophe in Blatten: eine Chronologie » (4.6.2025)
  5. blue News (bluewin.ch), « 70 percent of Blatten VS unbuildable according to new natural hazard map » (7.11.2025)
  6. Office fédéral de la statistique (OFS), STATPOP, chiffres provisoires au 31.12.2025, via citypopulation.de
  7. geo.admin.ch, service de recherche de swisstopo (lieu-dit Riedhaltä, coordonnées approchées du hameau)

Other villages near Ried

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