Tombstones Highlight Medieval Civilisation in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Smallest tombstone in the Radimlja necropolis, dedicated to a child. Photo: BIRN Tombstones Highlight Medieval Civilisation in Bosnia and HerzegovinaAzem KurticStolacBIRNAugust 25, 202207:22 There are tens of thousands of medieval ‘stecak’ tombstones around Bosnia and Herzegovina, giving insights into how people lived in the Middle Ages.

One of the most famous stecak necropolises in what is now Bosnia and Herzegovina is located some 30 kilometres south of the city of Mostar, right next to the main road towards the historically important town of Stolac.

The Radimlja necropolis has 135 tombstones — 63 of them with carved decorative motifs. The site was put under UNESCO protection in 2016.

For historians, the decorations on the stones say a lot about the person whose remains lie beneath them, but also about how people lived in the Middle Ages.

“If you see a sword and a shield, that means that person was in the military,” Andrea Markovic, who works at the institution that looks after the Radimlja necropolis, told BIRN.

“A bow and arrow meant that the person was an experienced hunter,” Markovic added.

Some of the tombstones date back to the 14th century, while most are from the 15th and 16th centuries. They were expensive to make at the time, so only rich and important people had them.

Some of the decorations depict grapes, wine production, deer-hunting and traditional dances, and some have epitaphs written in Bosancica, the Bosnian Cyrillic script which was used in the old Croatian language.

“Here lies a good man, Radoje Milovanovic, who was a son of duke Stipan,” says one of the epitaphs.

“This is how we know that we have a ducal family buried here,” Markovic said, explaining that the Milovanovics were an influential noble family at the time.

The true beauty of these monuments is that they tell a different story depending on the time of the day. As the sun crawls across the sky and the light changes, new stories emerge from the shadows.

There are around 60,000 of these tombstones in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Most of them are located on hills or in the mountains, and are sometimes hidden in forests. Many of these concealed stones are still being discovered.

In Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro combined, there are also around 10,000 of them.

However, not all of the stecak necropolises in Bosnia and Herzegovina are well preserved like Radimlja. In some places, they have been removed, destroyed or used as construction material.