Prevalje is a settlement and a municipality

Municipality

A municipality is essentially an urban administrative division having corporate status and usually powers of self-government. It can also be used to mean the governing body of a municipality. A municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district...

 in northern Slovenia

Slovenia

Slovenia , officially the Republic of Slovenia , is a country in Central and Southeastern Europe touching the Alps and bordering the Mediterranean. Slovenia borders Italy to the west, Croatia to the south and east, Hungary to the northeast, and Austria to the north, and also has a small portion of...

. It lies in the traditional Slovenian province of Carinthia. On 1 January 1999 Prevalje became an independent municipality. Prevalje lies in a valley where the Meža

Meža

The Meža is a long river in Carinthia, Slovenia. It has its source on the Austrian side of the state border near Mount Olševa, becomes subterranean a kilometer from its source, and reappears on the surface in Koprivna near Črna na Koroškem, Slovenia. It is the central river of the Mežica Valley...

 River emerges from a narrow gorge, full of fluvioglacial

Fluvioglacial landform

Fluvioglacial landforms are landforms molded by glacial meltwater. This discharge of glacial streams, both over the surface and beneath the ice sheet , is higher in the warmer summer months. As subglacial water often flows under pressure, it has a high velocity and is very turbulent...

 sediments. To the north the settlement is limited by the Strojna, Stražišče, and Dolga Brda hills. To the south are Navrski vrh (605 m) and Riflov vrh (726 m).

The historical center of Prevalje is on the left bank of the Meža, in the north edge of the valley ground, in the hamlet of Na Fari around the parish church

Parish church

A parish church , in Christianity, is the church which acts as the religious centre of a parish, the basic administrative unit of episcopal churches....

 dedicated to the Assumption of Mary

Assumption of Mary

According to the belief of Christians of the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and parts of the Anglican Communion and Continuing Anglicanism, the Assumption of Mary was the bodily taking up of the Virgin Mary into Heaven at the end of her life...

, known locally as Mary on the Lake .