Village
La Vall de Bianya is a mountain municipality in the Garrotxa, north of Olot, which brings together eleven settlements scattered through the valleys of Vianya and Bach, most of them founded beside a Romanesque church; its capital is Hostalnou de Vianya, although the most populated settlement is la Canya. It forms part of the Garrotxa Volcanic Zone natural park. Its name, documented since 958 as Vallebiania, has been written with V or with B depending on the period; one hypothesis links it to the Via Annia, a Roman road that crossed the valley on the way to the Capsacosta, and another to the union of two streams that form the Vianya stream. The main festival is celebrated for Saint Isidore in May, with the traditional scattering of sweets, and since 2008 it has also hosted the farro fair, in February.
Nature
The Vall del Bac, also known by the riera de Sant Jaume del Camp, is a mountain valley in the north of the Garrotxa, within the municipality of the Vall de Bianya, situated at the head of the riera d'Oix. It is a distinct population entity of about 30 inhabitants, traditionally spread across five scattered parishes: Sant Andreu de Porreres, Llongarriu, Sant Feliu del Bac, Sant Miquel de la Torre and Santa Magdalena del Coll, with the Hostal de la Vall del Bac as a landmark. It preserves numerous farmhouses and woodland and meadow landscapes of great natural value, and holds its main festival in August.
Monument
Sant Andreu de Porreres is an isolated Romanesque church on the left bank of the Vall de Bac, in La Vall de Bianya (Garrotxa), which for centuries was the main church of the valley. The original Romanesque body is today hidden among the sacristy, rectory and other additions, in a lamentable state of conservation; the semicircular apse with cornice and corbel frieze is recognisable, reinforced with buttresses after the 15th-century earthquakes, along with the old two-light bell-gable turned into a square tower. The place is recorded from 904 and in 977 bishop Miró granted it to the monastery of Sant Pere de Besalú. A Romanesque carving of Saint Mary was venerated there, possibly lost in the civil war, and it ceased to have parish functions in 1936.
Monument
12th-century church consecrated in 1117 by bishop Berenguer Dalmau, on the north slope of the Sant Miquel del Mont ridge; its origin goes back to a donation of 979 by count Miró Bonfill of Besalú to the abbey of Camprodon, which included the Mas Sovelles, the old manor house of the Socarrats family that gives the place its name. In the 18th century it was given a Latin-cross plan and the bell-gable was turned into a tower, and the 1982 restoration returned it to its original appearance. It preserves a Romanesque baptismal font and a pre-Romanesque capital with human heads set into the east façade. Its feast is the Roser, during Easter time, and in 2017 the 900th anniversary of its consecration was celebrated with a mass officiated by the bishop of Girona.
Monument
Church at the head of the Bianya valley, in the municipality of La Vall de Bianya, next to the old Roman road Via Annia. The first document mentioning it dates from 1090, when the chaplaincy of Sant Salvador was returned to the monastery of Sant Joan de les Abadesses; the second building, Romanesque, was consecrated in 1170, but the earthquakes of 1427-1428 destroyed it and it had to be rebuilt. The current building, with a single nave and a barrel vault widened at the sides, was restored in 1911 under the direction of Rafael Masó; the head forms a semicircular apse with a window adorned with capitals and columns, the door opens to the south and the bell tower rises above the west façade. It preserves a Modernista altar, also by Masó. The local feast is celebrated at Pascua Granada.
Monument
A 12th-century church at the foot of the sierra de Sant Miquel del Mont, with a nave with pointed vault, a transept and three semicircular apses (the north one from the 10th century), a bell tower and a Neoclassical doorway from 1855; it retains a Gothic image of Saint Margaret in polychrome alabaster. The place was donated in 858 to the monastery of Santa Maria de Ridaura and passed to Santa Maria de la Grassa in 953.
Monument
Sant Martí del Clot, also called Sant Martí de Tornadissa, is a 12th-century church located on the southern slope of the Malforat mountain range, above the left bank of the valley of Sant Ponç d'Aulina, within the municipality of La Vall de Bianya, in La Garrotxa. It preserves the apse, the vault and the voussoired portal, with an inscription recalling the 15th-century earthquakes that made it necessary to rebuild it, and 18th-century side chapels. The hamlet surrounding it, formerly belonging to Capsech, had 152 inhabitants in the mid-19th century according to Madoz's Dictionary, and only 39 in 2022.
Monument
Sant Pere Despuig is a scattered settlement in the municipality of La Vall de Bianya (La Garrotxa), located in the centre of the plateau that separates the streams of Santa Llúcia de Puigmal and Santa Margarida. The place is already mentioned in the year 858, when it was granted to the monastery of Riudaura, and the bishop of Girona, Arnulf, consecrated a first church in the year 964, built thanks to the old Bianya family, who lived in the farmhouse known as the Torre de Sant Pere. The present church, from the 12th century, adopted a Latin-cross plan in the 18th century, when the bell-gable was turned into a tower, and it has a Baroque doorway dated 1782 with iconography of the apostles. The most important local feasts are that of Sant Antoni, in January, and that of the Puríssima, in December.
Monument
Sant Miquel del Mont crowns the summit of the mountain of the same name, at 792 metres above sea level, next to a geodetic point. The church, with a rectangular nave and a semicircular apse to the east, was consecrated in 958 by Bishop Arnulf of Girona, although the very name of Sant Miquel could indicate that an oratory dedicated to the god Mercury once stood there. It has a doorway with three graduated arches with a tympanum and a bell-gable with two openings; inside, capitals and cornices preserve very deteriorated ornamental decoration, including a human figure. Beneath the building the remains of a watchtower, possibly Roman, have been located, measuring 5.5 by 5.5 metres with a wall thickness of 0.7 metres. The church was restored in 1933.
Monument
A 12th-century church on a wooded hillock in the south-western part of the vall del Bac, with a single nave, a pointed vault and a transverse arch, with no differentiated apse, a round-arched doorway to the south and a bell tower -which replaced a bell-gable with two openings- today almost in ruins, reached by an outside stone staircase. It appears in a document of 946 and was consecrated on 20 January 966 by Bishop Otó of Girona; in 1996 a Romanesque altar stone and a rectangular baptismal font were found. It lost its status as a parish and became a chapel of ease of Sant Andreu de Porreres; it was restored in 2012, when an archaeological intervention confirmed that no elements of the original slate roof had survived.
Monument
A church situated at the foot of the mountain of Malforat, with a Latin-cross plan and three original apses of which the central one survives, a nave with pointed vault and side chapels added in the 17th and 18th centuries (with ashlars dated 1675 and 1771); it belonged to the monastery of Sant Pere de Camprodon and houses a Romanesque baptismal font decorated with rope mouldings and hanging crosses, unique in the diocese of Girona.
Monument
A Romanesque church with a single nave and a semicircular apse facing east, in the municipality of La Vall de Bianya, with later modifications that blur its original structure; the apse preserves a frieze supported by corbels, and the bell tower, which must have been a bell-gable, became a square tower in the 18th century. Its first documentary reference dates from the year 979, when it is cited as Sancti Martino in valle biannia in the will of Miró, count of Besalú and bishop of Girona. The place name, together with that of the church's patron, changed over time until it settled on Solamal, after passing through forms such as Solermal in 1358 or Solamala in 1362; the church is sometimes also referred to as Sant Martí de Bianya.
Monument
A church from the late 12th or early 13th century in the vall del Bac, also known as Sant Miquel d'Avellanacorba, with a single nave with a square apse, a two-opening bell-gable and a round-arched doorway on the south side, with remains of the original slate-slab roof beneath the tiles; the place appears in 978 as Avellana Curba and by 998 is already recorded as a parish. The episcopal visitations of 1432 document the damage from the 1428 earthquake.
Monument
A 12th-century hermitage on the south-western foothills of the Capsacosta mountain range, at the head of the Sant Ponç valley, where the stream of the same name rises. It is documented in 1342 as Sancti Poncii de Olina, a name that by around 1362-1372 already appeared as Aulina. Faced with the threat of collapse and the wish of the bishop of Girona to hold worship there, it was reformed between 1758 and 1760, when the bell tower and part of the walls were demolished and rebuilt: a rectangular plan with added side sections, a round-arched doorway to the west with a plain tympanum and a lintel bearing a cross inscribed in a circle, and a bell tower attached to the north-east. At the time it was presided over by a Baroque altar with a dressed image of the patron saint.
Monument
A small church in ruins, atop a hill near the Coll farmhouse, in the vall del Bac, with a single nave, a square apse, a bell-gable and a round-arched window carved from a single piece above the door. In 1776 a sacristy and a Neoclassical side altar with half-columns and acanthus capitals were added, possibly the chapel of the Holy Christ mentioned in the pastoral visits of 1738 and 1776, which record a single unconsecrated altar. In the mid-19th century the whole church was whitewashed, and a great feast was held at Pascua Florida and on 22 July. Today its vault is partly collapsed; its Baroque altarpiece, which had later presided over Sant Miquel de la Torre, was moved to Olot in 1973.
Monument
A much-altered 12th-century Romanesque church, located in the settlement of Castellar de la Muntanya, today in the municipality of La Vall de Bianya. It is a building with a single rectangular nave covered by a barrel vault; the head, to the east, has a semicircular apse with a modified central window, and the entrance opens on the south side, where a doorway was preserved that is now at Sant Llorenç d'Oix. The bell tower is a tower proper, and the sacristy and the rectory are 18th-century additions. It also preserves a plain immersion baptismal font, out of its original place and half embedded in the wall. The place is recorded in a donation of 1001 to the monastery of Sant Pere de Camprodon, and in 1079 the viscounts of Bas donated it to establish the priory of Sant Joan les Fonts.
Monument
A hermitage also called Santa Maria de Sacot, from the 12th-13th centuries, situated at about 740 metres above sea level overlooking the riera d'Oix, next to the old family house of Llongarriu, in the vall del Bac. It has a single nave with a rectangular chapel to the east, a rectangular entrance to the west, the remains of a sundial and a bell-gable with two round arches; documented in 1066 as Sanctae Mariae de Cod, it fell into ruin after the 1428 earthquake and was rebuilt by order of the bishop of Girona, as recorded by an inscription of 1672. By the mid-15th century the parish of the Vall del Bac was already Sant Andreu de Porreres, and at Sacot mass was said only once or twice a month, for the feast of the Assumption, its patronal feast. Its altarpiece was lost in the fire of 1936.