Village
A Caniza is a town in the province of Pontevedra, capital of the comarca of Paradanta, wedged between the sierra do Faro de Avión —where the Alto de la Cruz reaches 1,095 metres— and the valley of the Deva river, which crosses it from north to south. At its foot lies the sanctuary of Santa María da Franqueira, whose origin may go back to a 6th-century hermitage and which received its present church in 1293 from the hands of the Cistercian order; the monastery enjoyed royal privileges from 1056, when Ferdinand I placed it under the protection of the Benedictine monks. The municipality also preserves megalithic remains and Iron Age castros, such as those of Graces and Coto das Cavadas, and on its slopes cured ham remains its best-known product. It now has about 5,000 inhabitants.
Monument
Monastery documented since a donation by Ferdinand I to abbot Alvito in 1063 and incorporated into the Cistercian order around 1293, after having been built by the lords of Sobroso in the 13th century for the Bernardine order; of the old monastery only the parish church remains. Its church, begun in 1343 according to the lintel itself, is in late Romanesque style with Gothic elements and shows the Adoration of the Magi on the tympanum. The site, situated on the slopes of Monte Paradanta, is home to the popular pilgrimage of the Franqueira, which according to legend settled there because the oxen carrying the image of the Virgin stopped to drink at the monastery's spring.
Nature
A Celtic hillfort listed in the municipal heritage catalogue and still unrestored; it goes together with other fortified settlements in the municipality such as those of Grades, Coto do Castro, Coto das Cavadas and Barreiros.
Monument
A bridge of Romanesque build at the place of Pintelos, parish of Valeixe, one of the municipality's three listed historic crossings along with those of Achas and Noceifas, on the old roads that ran down towards the Miño.
Monument
A manor house at Parada de Achas, one of the three in the municipality included in the municipal heritage catalogue along with the Pazo de Cucuruxo and that of the Araújo family, both in the parish of Valeixe.
Nature
At 1,095 metres it is the highest point in the municipality, at the end of the Serra do Faro de Avión; the Uma, Ribadil and Deva rivers rise on these summits, in a zone of transition between the oceanic and Mediterranean climates.
Curiosity
The municipal coat of arms approved in 2007 shows an oak on a green field with nine gules acorns, an image that refers to the oak woods covering these slopes and to the municipality's forest identity.
Activity
Held every 15 August since 1966 in the oak grove of O Cacharado, it opens with a parade of country carts and of young men and women dressed in Galician costume carrying trays of ham; it is declared of Tourist Interest in Galicia.
Activity
Spring pilgrimage of the Virxe da Franqueira, at the Marian sanctuary in the parish of A Caniza, held on Whit Monday and bringing together pilgrims from the comarcas of Condado and A Paradanta and from the neighbouring Portuguese border. Devotion to this image, one of the oldest Marian images in Galicia, dates back to the 6th century: according to legend, the Virgin appeared among the rocks of the Coto da Vella, and the spot where the ox cart carrying her, guided blindfolded, came to a halt marked the site of the sanctuary. The first reliable reference to the monastery is from 1063, when King Ferdinand I made a donation to its abbot; of the medieval building, from the 14th century, only the church survives, with a notable Gothic-Romanesque doorway from 1343.
Nature
An Iron Age fortified settlement, one of the four castros catalogued in the municipality along with those of Coto do Castro, Coto das Cavadas and Barreiros, in lands inhabited by the Grovii before Romanisation.
Curiosity
The municipality preserves engravings and megalithic stations spread across its hills, such as Laxiña das Cruces, the Coto da Regueira do Valiño, As Casiñas dos Mouros or the Tomada de Estremadoiro, with tumuli and engraved rocks.
Curiosity
The name alludes to the canizos, huts of interwoven and thatched canes that the residents of Valeixe put up; the Castilianised form held out until in 2026 the official gazetteer restored the Galician A Caniza.
Historical milestone
The first written notice of the parish is the donation that King Ferdinand I made in 1063 to abbot Alvito and to the friars who dwelt in the monastery, the documentary starting point of the concello's history.
Historical milestone
The Catastro de Ensenada, drawn up between 1749 and 1756, portrays A Franqueira, in A Caniza, as a lively village: a monastic guesthouse, an apothecary, four inns, a tailor, farriers, eight muleteers carrying Ribeiro wine, and even two dealers in linens brought from Madrid.
Activity
The villa devotes its great gastronomic event to ham cured in the drying houses of the sierra, cut by knife and served with maize bread and Condado wine; it is one of the most veteran pork festivals in Galicia.
Historical milestone
The neighbourhood born of the cañizas, huts of interwoven branches raised by residents of Valeixe, had been an ecclesiastical annexe of the bishopric of Tui since 1790 and won its full parish independence by court ruling; by 1820 it would already have its own mayor.
Curiosity
A snow well linked to the monastery of A Franqueira: in it the snow fallen in winter was pressed and stored, later serving to preserve food and to supply the comarca with ice before refrigeration existed.
Curiosity
An iron-bearing spring on the slope of the monte Pedroso, a kilometre from the town, around which grew a spa that lived its heyday between the end of the nineteenth century and the third decade of the twentieth, at the height of the Galician spa boom.