Church of All Saints, Kljenak

The church of All Saints in Kljenak, in the town of Vrgorac in Split-Dalmatia County, is interesting because medieval stećci are built into its walls. Thus sacred architectural heritage and tombstones of earlier centuries meet in one place.

It is a single-nave building with a square apse in the east and an entrance in the west, and the façade is adorned with a three-part bell gable. It was probably built in the first half of the 18th century on the foundations of an older church. Fourteen stećci are built into the walls, and a fifteenth in the interior serves as the base of the altar. All of them testify that there was once a medieval cemetery around the church.

The church and cemetery with stećci are a protected cultural good, entered in the Register of Cultural Goods of the Republic of Croatia under the code Z-2802.

Photo: KO Imotski, CC BY-SA 3.0 hr, Wikimedia Commons.
Data: Register of Cultural Goods of the Republic of Croatia (Ministry of Culture and Media), Open Licence; coordinates: DGU (centre of the settlement).