Zagreb for Stamp Collectors: Dolac Market and St Mark’s Church on Stamps

Hrvatska pošta (Croatian Post), in cooperation with the Zagreb Tourist Board and the City of Zagreb has promoted special postage stamps which show Dolac market and St Mark’s Church.

They are part of a special series of postage stamps called “Croatian Tourism – Zagreb” based on the photographs of Davor Rostuhar and designed by Vladimir Buzolić-Stegu, both Zagreb-based artists. The value of the stamp with the Dolac market motif is 2.80 kuna, and the one with St Mark’s Church is 5.80 kuna. The print run is 200,000 copies per design, and the stamps are printed on sheets of 10 stamps. These stamps are on sale in the Hrvatska pošta online shop at www.epostshop.hr

Why Dolac market and St Mark’s Church as the motifs? St Mark’s Square, with St Mark’s Church, has not changed much since it was built in 1242. It was the centre of public and political life, first of all of the royal free city of Gradec, or Zagreb, and then of the whole of Croatia. On the square in front of St Mark’s Church for centuries city news was proclaimed, the Croatian Bans took their oaths, and this beautiful tradition was revived in 1992 by the first President of independent Croatia Dr Franjo Tuđman. The church’s most valuable artistic treasure is its Gothic south portal while the church is made especially interesting by its roof with coloured glazed tiles. The left side of the roof shows the historical coat of arms of the Triune Kingdom of Croatia, Dalmatia and Slavonia, and the right side shows the coat of arms of the City of Zagreb with wide open city doors, the symbol of the hospitality of Zagreb’s citizens.

Dolac market is without a doubt a tourist attraction visited by almost half of all visitors to our city. It was opened in 1930 and it is an important, if not the most important part of Zagreb’s gastronomic offering. For centuries hard-working women (known as kumice) from the countryside around Zagreb every day brought baskets full of home-grown produce to the city. As a sign of their gratitude to all these women the citizens of Zagreb erected a statue of a kumica, known as Barica, on the steps leading up to the market.