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Definition of canniness : Caution; crafty management.

Synonyms:

craft, intelligence, artifice, sneakiness, hardheadedness, clear-sightedness, caginess, knowingness, guilefulness, keenness

slipperiness, sly, art, deviousness, skill, cunning, slickness, mastery, guile, snakiness, ingenuity, subtlety, wariness, smoothness

facility, irony, craftiness, trickiness, deftness, ingeniousness, astuteness, resourcefulness, comedy, wit, adroitness, humor, brilliance, cleverness, urbanity, shrewdness, finesse, wiliness, inventiveness, scurrility, foxiness, sharpness, intellect, artfulness, drollness, cunningness, slyness, sophistry, scintillation, quickness, subtleness

insight, foresight, intuition, instinct

Usage examples:

• And so it came about that Major Bayne, possessing in a large measure the quality of " canniness" characteristic of his race- a quality which for the benefit of the uninitiated Saxon it may be necessary to define as being a judicious blending of shrewdness and caution,- and being as well, again after the manner of his race, ambitious for his own advancement, and, furthermore, being a man of conscience, had been so entirely engrossed in the absorbing business of " watching his step" that he had paid slight heed to the affairs of any other officer, and least of all to those of the chaplain, whose functions in the battalion he had regarded, it must be confessed, as more or less formal, if not merely decorative. - "The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land", Ralph Connor.
• Where- over he gaes, there he'll tak' wi' him the canniness, the meanness if ye maun call it such, his childhood taught him. - "Between You and Me", Sir Harry Lauder.
• But still her love purified her, and almost sanctified the strategy she practised, the lies she told, the truths she concealed, the plots she devised with the uncanny canniness of an old peasant. - "In a Little Town", Rupert Hughes.