VISOKO HERITAGE MUSEUM

Established in 1953, this museum (Zavičajni Muzej Visoko) is housed in the former town hall, a yellow neo-Moorish building from 1902 typical of the local Austro-Hungarian style. It houses a rich archaeological collection from the very important Neolithic sites in the area, unfortunately almost all of which are closed to the public. In particular, one can admire pottery and zoomorphic figurines from the site of Okolište (6 km to the northwest). Founded around 5200 B.C. by the men of the Kakanj culture, then occupied by those of the Butmir culture, Okolište extended over 7 ha and counted up to 3,500 inhabitants. It was once the most populated place in Europe. The site has been excavated by a German-Bosnian team since 2002. Also on display are iron spears from the Vratnica burial mound, jewelry (diadem, fibulae) from Gračanica and other objects from the nearby sites of Arnautovići, Zbilje and Donje Moštre. The museum has seven other collections. The numismatic one has more than a thousand coins and banknotes from antiquity to the present day, including Greco-Ililian drachmae, and the medieval one includes, in particular, 14th-century glazed ceramics from the royal city on Visočica Hill. Also worth seeing are the collections of ethnography, geology and paleontology, weapons (including those used in the last war), oriental literature (Ottoman period) and art (with a painting by the great Tuzla painter Ismet Mujezinović).