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Alcañices (Municipality, Castilla y León, Spain)

Flag of Alcañices, left, as used - Image by Ivan Sache, 22 May 2016; right, as prescribed - Image by Eduardo Panizo (Vexilla Hispanica website), 3 January 2014

Presentation of Alcañices
Symbols of Alcañices

See also:

Presentation of Alcañices

The municipality of Alcañices (298 inhabitants in 2010; 10,511 ha; municipal website) is located in the west of the Province of Zamora, on the border with Portugal, 70 km from Zamora. The municipality is made of the villages of Alcañices (capital), Alcorcillo, Santa Ana and Vivinera.

Alcañices is a name of Arabic origin, meaning "churches". After the Christian reconquest, Alcañices was fortified by the Knight Templars. The village was mentioned for the first time in a document dated 29 April 1211, signed by King of León Alfonso IX and Gómez Ramírez, Grand Master of the Order (for León, Castile and Portugal?).
The Treaty of Alcañices, signed on 12 September 1297 by Kings Dinis of Portugal (1261-1325, king in 1279) and Ferdinand IV of Castile (1285-1312, king in 1295), fixed the borders between the two countries, as they are still today between Portugal and Spain.
The Marquisate of Alcañices was granted by Charles V on 15 December 1533 to Francisco Enríquez de Almansa (1475-1541), 5th lord of Alcañices, as a reward for his support during the War of the Comuneros. The Marquis and his wife, Isabel de Ulloa (d. 1544), rebuilt the church, established a Franciscan monastery (1547) and totally rebuilt the town walls. Their son Martín Enríquez de Almansa (1510-1583) was appointed Vice-Roy of New Spain (1568-1580) and Vice-Roy of Peru (1581-1583).

Ivan Sache, 3 January 2014

Symbols of Alcañices

The flag and arms of Alcañices are prescribed by an Agreement adopted on 22 July 2000 by the Municipal Council, signed on 24 July 2000 by the Mayor, and published on 4 August 2000 in the official gazette of Castila y León, No. 151, p. 9,583 (text).
The symbols are described as follows:

Flag: Rectangular flag, with proportions 2:3, made of a red panel with a white cross throughout of 1/7 the flag's hoist, a yellow castle masoned sable in the upper hoist and lower fly quarters, a white scimitar in the upper fly quarter and a white lion in the lower fly quarter.
Coat of arms: Quarterly, 1. and 4. Gules a castle or masoned sable port and windows azure, 2. Argent a scimitar gules per bend surrounded by two bezants of the same, 3. Argent a lion rampant gules. The shield surmounted with a Royal crown closed.

The flag in actual, official use differs from the flag officially adopted, being vertically divided red-yellow with the municipal coat of arms in the center (photo, photo).

Ivan Sache, 22 May 2016