FRANCISCAN MUSEUM OF JAJCE

This museum (Franjevački Muzej Jajce) is housed in the Catholic monastery of St. Luke (Samostan Svetog Luke) founded by the Franciscan order in 1877. Established in 1905, it is famous for its centerpiece: the skeleton presented as that of the last king of Bosnia, Stefan Tomašević, executed in Jajce in 1463. Displayed out of the way, in a glass sarcophagus, these bones were discovered near the town in 1888. Nothing is specified, but it is not certain that it is the body of the king. The age of the deceased (between 20 and 30 years) and the fact that the head was found away from it are worth here as evidence, since Stefan Tomašević was beheaded by the Ottomans in his twenty-fifth year. The rest of the museum benefits from a sharper and more modern presentation with three beautiful rooms renovated in 2018. There are collections of sacred art, ethnology and archaeology. The latter houses one of the three Mošunj swords in the country: forged about 3,500 years ago, it corresponds to the one unearthed in Veliki Mošunj, near Vitez, and kept in the National Museum, in Sarajevo. Also noteworthy are the bas-reliefs from Roman temples dedicated to Jupiter and Silvanus, as well as the pieces from the Church of St. Mary, including an Ottoman inscription from the period when the building was transformed into a mosque. As for the monastery itself, it is of little interest. Blown up by the Bosnian Serb army in 1992, it was rebuilt in 1999.