Granitsa is a village in southwestern Bulgaria

Bulgaria

Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...

, part of Kyustendil

Kyustendil

Kyustendil is a town in the far west of Bulgaria, the capital of Kyustendil Province, with a population of 44 416 . Kyustendil is situated in the southern part of the Kyustendil Valley, 90 km southwest of Sofia...

 municipality, Kyustendil Province

Kyustendil Province

-Religion:Religious adherence in the province according to 2001 census:-Language:Mother tongues in the province according to 2001 census:* 153,242 Bulgarian * 7,929 Roma  * 1363 others and unspecified -Ethnic groups:...

.

Granitsa lies in a hilly valley in the eastern Osogovo

Osogovo

Osogovo or Osogovska Planina is a mountain and ski resort between southwestern Bulgaria and northeastern Republic of Macedonia,...

 mountains. It is bisected by a ravine, the bed of a rivulet which goes almost dry in the summer and autumn. Granitsa includes several neighbourhoods: Yakimova, Dzhoneva, Gorchovska, Efendiyska and Antova. The village was first mentioned in Vladislav the Grammarian

Vladislav the Grammarian

Vladislav the Grammarian was a fifteenth-century Bulgarian monk, writer, historian and theologian.He worked in both medieval Bulgaria and Serbia and is regarded as both Serbian and Bulgarian author...

's account of 1448: ПРИ ВЄЛБОУЖДИ НА СЕЛѢ НѢКОТОРЄМИ ЖИВОУЩЄ, ГРАНИЦА ЖЄ ОУБО ТОМОУ ПРОЗВАНѤ ИМОУЩОУ. At the time, the sons of the local Bulgarian noble (bolyarin

Boyar

A boyar, or bolyar , was a member of the highest rank of the feudal Moscovian, Kievan Rus'ian, Bulgarian, Wallachian, and Moldavian aristocracies, second only to the ruling princes , from the 10th century through the 17th century....

) and later monk Jacob (Yakov) from Krupnik settled in Saint Luke's Monastery above Granitsa. The three brothers Joasaph (Yoasaf), David and Theophanes (Teofan) reconstructed the deserted and plundered Rila Monastery

Rila Monastery

The Monastery of Saint Ivan of Rila, better known as the Rila Monastery is the largest and most famous Eastern Orthodox monastery in Bulgaria. It is situated in the southwestern Rila Mountains, south of the capital Sofia in the deep valley of the Rilska River at an elevation of above sea level...

 in 1453–1466. In 1469, they initiated the return of Saint John of Rila

John of Rila

Saint John of Rila was the first Bulgarian hermit. He was revered as a saint while he was still alive. The legend surrounding him tells of wild animals that freely came up to him and birds that landed in his hands. His followers founded many churches in his honor, including the famous Rila...

's remains from Veliko Tarnovo

Veliko Tarnovo

Veliko Tarnovo is a city in north central Bulgaria and the administrative centre of Veliko Tarnovo Province. Often referred to as the "City of the Tsars", Veliko Tarnovo is located on the Yantra River and is famous as the historical capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire, attracting many tourists...

 to the monastery. The village's name is derived from the dialectal word granítsa, "a sort of branched oak

Oak

An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus Quercus , of which about 600 species exist. "Oak" may also appear in the names of species in related genera, notably Lithocarpus...

", from the Bulgarian word granka, "offshoot, offset".

Granitsa was also mentioned in Ottoman

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 tax registers of 1576 as Graniçe. In the 19th century, most of the land in the village was the property of Turkish

Turkish people

Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...

 (Liman Ağa, Daut Beg) and Jewish (Sari Bohor) farm owners from Kyustendil. Landmarks in and around the village include the Bulgarian National Revival

Bulgarian National Revival

The Bulgarian National Revival , sometimes called the Bulgarian Renaissance, was a period of socio-economic development and national integration among Bulgarian people under Ottoman rule...

-time Church of Saint Elijah (1856–1857) and the residential defensive tower

Tower

A tower is a tall structure, usually taller than it is wide, often by a significant margin. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires....

 known as the Granitski House (1856), both built by Master Milenko. The Granitsa Monastery of Saint Luke lies to the southwest and may date to the 10th century; reconstructed in 1948, it is a fully active Bulgarian Orthodox monastery. Also southwest of Granitsa are the ruins of the eponymous medieval

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...

 fortress from the Second Bulgarian Empire

Second Bulgarian Empire

The Second Bulgarian Empire was a medieval Bulgarian state which existed between 1185 and 1396 . A successor of the First Bulgarian Empire, it reached the peak of its power under Kaloyan and Ivan Asen II before gradually being conquered by the Ottomans in the late 14th-early 15th century...

, probably a defensive station on the Velbazhd-Shtip

Štip

Štip is the largest urban agglomeration in the eastern part of the Republic of Macedonia, serving as the economic, industrial, entertainment and educational focal point for the surrounding municipalities. As of the 2002 census, the Štip municipality alone had a population of about 47,796...

 road. Another landmark is the Venerable Beech

Beech

Beech is a genus of ten species of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia and North America.-Habit:...

 Forest, a protected area

Protected area

Protected areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognised natural, ecological and/or cultural values. There are several kinds of protected areas, which vary by level of protection depending on the enabling laws of each country or the regulations of the international...

 established in 1995 and covering 1.3 hectares (13,000 m²).

The village's football club is called Slavia

Slavia

Slavia may refer to:* Medieval toponymy** One of the tribal centers of early East Slavs, see Saqaliba** The medieval name for the Wendish settlement area** The medieval name for the duchy of Pomerania** The medieval name for Mecklenburg...

 and plays in the municipal amateur league. The local industry

Industry

Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...

 is represented by a branch of the Kyustendil winery

Winery

A winery is a building or property that produces wine, or a business involved in the production of wine, such as a wine company. Some wine companies own many wineries. Besides wine making equipment, larger wineries may also feature warehouses, bottling lines, laboratories, and large expanses of...

. Wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

 production, vine

Vine

A vine in the narrowest sense is the grapevine , but more generally it can refer to any plant with a growth habit of trailing or scandent, that is to say climbing, stems or runners...

 and fruit

Fruit

In broad terms, a fruit is a structure of a plant that contains its seeds.The term has different meanings dependent on context. In non-technical usage, such as food preparation, fruit normally means the fleshy seed-associated structures of certain plants that are sweet and edible in the raw state,...

 growing are well developed. There is a regular bus

Bus

A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...

link to the municipal and provincial capital.