High-grade highly deformed gneisses crop out continuously along the Masanteo peninsula in the Cabo Ortegal nappe (NW Spain). The rock sequence formed by quartzo-feldspathic gneisses and mafic rocks records two partial melting events: during the Early Ordovician (ca. 480–488 Ma.), at the base of the Qz-Fsp gneisses, and immediately after eclogization (ca. 390.4 ± 1.2 Ma), during its early Variscan exhumation. Despite the strain accumulated during their final exhumation in which a pervasive blastomylonitic S2 foliation was developed, primary sedimentary layering in Qz-Fsp gneisses is well preserved locally at the top of the sequence. This first stage of the exhumation process occurred in ~ 10 Ma, during which bulk flattening of the high-grade rock sequence was accommodated by anastomosing shear bands that evolved to planar shear zones. Strain was progressively localized along the boundaries of the migmatitic Qz-Fsp gneisses. A SE-vergent ductile thrust constitutes the base of gneisses, incorporating eclogite blocks-in-matrix. A NW-vergent detachment placed the metasedimentary Qz-Fsp gneisses over the migmatitic Qz-Fsp gneisses. A difference in metamorphic pressure of ca. 0.5 GPa is estimated between both gneissic units. The high-grade deformation reduced substantially the thickness of the gneissic rock sequence during the process of exhumation controlled by change in the strain direction and the progressive localization of strain. The combined movement of the top detachment and basal thrust resulted in an extrusion of the migmatites within the nappe, directed to the SE in current coordinates.