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Gothic lintel from the Royal Court at Bobovac

The upper palace of the royal court at Bobovac, a rectangular building 19 metres long and 5.6 metres wide, contained a small court chapel and had large two- and three-mullioned windows. Among the decorative sculpture from the palace, especially interesting is the section of the lintel, which features the following: a transenna (a perforated sheet of stone used to shut windowsor gate fences, usually a geometric, plant-shaped, or animal-shaped ornament), a part of a gothic arch, and a relief ornament of a stylised Bosnian crown superimposed on the Gothic letter R, formed out of a voluptuous ribbon.

The combination of the letter R and the crown is unique among the known mediaeval Bosnian heraldic motifs. On the other hand, the fleur-de-lis crown itself is a standard motif, which has many known parallels in heraldic depictions on coins, seals, and architectural sculpture. As a rule, all of these depictions are connected to the ruling dynasty whose rulers bore the title of king, not Ban, from 1377 onwards.

Type

Section of a gothic lintel

Dating

14th–15th century

Location

Bobovac

Material and technique

Stone

Availability

This artefact can seen in the Archaeology Pavilion as part of the exhibition Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Middle Ages.