Vavray-le-Petit

Location

Vavray-le-Petit lies in the Marne département, about 15 kilometres north-east of Vitry-le-François. With an area of 5.35 square kilometres and 60 inhabitants (2023), it is one of the very small communes of the region. The settlement is rural in character, with houses scattered across the land. Its neighbours are Val-de-Vière, Heiltz-l’Évêque, Vavray-le-Grand, Bassuet and Bassu. Since 2014 the village has belonged to the Communauté de communes Côtes de Champagne et Saulx.

Landscape and viticulture

The commune rises from the Vière valley in the south, around 108 metres above sea level, to a prominent hill in the north at 208 metres. Its south-facing slope is planted with vines. That is the village's link to winegrowing: a sunny slope of the kind often used for vines in Champagne.

Anyone looking for famous names here will not find them. Vavray-le-Petit is classified neither as grand cru nor as premier cru, and no well-known champagne houses are connected with the village. The land use shows where the emphasis lies: in 2018, 74.6 per cent of the area was farmland, of which 55.7 per cent was arable. Woodland accounts for 25.4 per cent, meadows for 9.8 per cent and permanent crops for 4.4 per cent.

“With an area of 5.35 square kilometres and 60 inhabitants (2023), it is one of the very small communes of the region.

Climate and water

The climate is temperate oceanic with cool summers. The nearest Météo-France weather station, in Frignicourt, 15 kilometres away, records an annual mean temperature of 11.5 °C and an average of 694.6 millimetres of rainfall a year for 1991 to 2020. Extremes are part of the picture: 41.7 °C in July 2019 and minus 22 °C in January 1985.

The Vière flows through the valley, a river 42 kilometres long that rises at Noirlieu and joins the Chée at Outrepont. Its gauging station lies within the commune of Vavray-le-Petit. During the flood of 4 February 2020, a peak daily mean of 30.8 cubic metres per second was recorded there.

Vavray-le-Grand in der ChampagneFoto: Roland45, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Name and sights

The village name is old: in 1153 it appears as Wavreium. It goes back to a Gaulish word for uncultivated, scrubby and damp land, which fits the village's position by the river.

The source names the church of Saint-Patrice as the sight worth seeing. It holds a stone Madonna and Child from the 16th century, protected as a monument historique since 1911.

• Département: Marne, Grand Est region
• Area: 5.35 km²
• Altitude: 108 to 208 metres
• Particularity: planted south-facing slope in the north of the commune

For wine lovers, Vavray-le-Petit is not a destination for tastings but a stop off the beaten track. Anyone exploring the area around Vitry-le-François will find a quiet corner here, with a church, a river valley and a vineyard slope.