2008The Vintage Days - Brotnjo (Zilavka) - First Day Cover

"The Vintage Days in Brotnjo” (held for the first time in 1956) are not only strengthening togetherness of Brotnjo inhabitants and their guests, but they are preserving and fostering the national heritage as well as stimulating a development of tourist offer, agriculture and economy. Brotnjo is situated in the south-west of Bosnia and Herzegovina and is the biggest wine-growing area in Herzegovina. More than 1400 hectares are under vineyards planted mostly by autochthonous varieties of Žilavka and Blatina. Those varieties are decorating the landscape in Brotnjo from ancient times, written traces are reaching the times of the King Tvrtko (1353), and they are absorbing the sun by their grape-vines and clusters in the Herzegovinian karst pouring it out into high-quality white and red wines with the seal of Herzegovina. .On FDC is a fragment of a thinner stone slate showing Bacchante (Maenad), female follower of the god Bacchus (Liber) respected in the Roman religion as the god of fertility, growth and joy, whilst was become equal with the god Dionysus. The relief shows a woman player, a grape tree with matured clusters is carved out from her left side, which has been found in the area of Čerin (Čitluk). It could date back to the 1st to 2nd century and today is kept in the museum of the Franciscan monastery in Humac.