Podzemna crkva i katakombe Jajce

Useful Information

Location:	Svetog Luke, Jajce 70101, Bosnien und Herzegowina. (44.3395478, 17.2682428)
Open:	All year daily Mon 8:40-15, Tue-Fri 10-15, Sat 8-18, Sun 10-15. [2025]
Fee:	Adults BAM 5. [2025]
Classification:	Cave Church Cave Tomb
Light:	Incandescent
Dimension:
Guided tours:	self guided
Photography:	allowed
Accessibility:
Bibliography:
Address:	Podzemna crkva i katakombe Jajce, Svetog Luke, Jajce 70101, Bosnien und Herzegowina, Tel: +387-30-658-268.
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then. Please check rates and details directly with the companies in question if you need more recent info.

History

1396	Hrvoje Vukčić Hrvatinić is mentioned as the count of Jajce (conte di Jajcze).
1400	begin of construction.
1416	construction completed, Hrvoje Vukčić buried in the tomb.
2003	protected as a Historic Monument.

Description

Podzemna crkva i katakombe Jajce (Underground Church with Catacombs in Jajce) were built as a burial ground for Hrvoje Vukčić, Grand Duke of Bosnia. He ordered the construction as his tomb for him and his family in the late 14th century, and the construction took until the early 15th century. It is located on the south-western side of the walled city of Jajce. Originally it was outside the town’s ramparts, but walls encompassed it after the second and third phase of fortification upgrade during the 15th century.

The term catacomb is used very flexible for all kinds of underground structures. This is an underground tomb, but the structure or design resembles a church, with a narthex, baptistery with a baptismal fonts, a nave, and a presbytery with an altar space. It has two levels, and the lower level is the actual crypt. There are several sculptures cut into the walls, like the sculpted cross, sun and crescent moon motifs. They are typical for the independent Bosnian Church.

The narthex is a narrow space measuring 2.18 m by 5.50 m with a barrel vault. A passage leads through a low, narrow aperture with a semi-cylindrical vault. The baptistery measuring 7.50 m by 2.05 m follows, with baptismal fonts in the transepts to the left and right. A stone seat has three round holes to hold holy water fonts. The church nave is 2.80 m by 4.00 m and has burial vaults in the floor, with arched openings about 1.20 m. There are vaults on both sides, but while the left side is 2 m deep and completed, the right side is only 20 cm deep and seems unfinished. The baptistery and the nave to the presbytery are vaulted with a barrel vault, which turns in the center into a pointed vault with a height of 4.15 m. The presbytery is narrow, only 2.94 m wide but 10.66 m long.

According to local lore, Tito hid here for some time in 1943, and he signed documents from the second AVNOJ meetings here. Those documents established Yugoslavia as a multi-ethnic federal state.