The Jesuit High School in Požega

CROATIA, 1999, the 3rd centenary of the school, Scott 410

The Jesuits were active in Požega from 1698 until the Suppression in 1773. They set up a high school (gymnasium) and a college in 1699 (the same year that Antun Kanižlic was born in this town). They owned the Kutjevo estate and the income from that estate was used to finance the schools. Along with the full 6-year secondary school education program, they organized a school of Philosophy and Theology, the Academia Posegana, which flourished between 1761 until 1776. After 1773 the teaching in the high school was continued by the former Jesuits who stayed as staff. The school was taken over by the Paulists in 1776, and by the Franciscans in 1786.

The Cathedral of St. Vitus, Rijeka

  
FIUME, 1923, Scott 178-180

The city of Rijeka (Fiume in Italian, both names meaning river) is the principal seaport and third largest city of Croatia. Although there has been a church dedicated to the patron saint and protector of Rijeka since the Middle Ages, the Cathedral as we see it today was founded in 1638 by the Jesuits and is pictured on these stamps in the hands of St. Vitus, its patron. It was promoted to Cathedral status in 1922. As the stamps and their overprints indicate, Rijeka was an independent state (called Fiume) in 1923, but was incorporated into Italy in 1924. In 1945 Yugoslavia liberated it from German occupation and incorporated it in 1947 as part of the province of Croatia, which became a separate nation in 1991. The Church was designed by Br. Giacomo Briano da Modena, SJ (1589-1649), the Society’s architect in Poland and in Northern Italy.

  
1924, Scott 190-192

  
1924, Scott 202-204

The Classical Gymnasium or College at Zagreb

CROATIA, 2007, the 400th anniversary of the Classical Gymnasium at Zagreb
The "CD" on the book is the Roman numeral for 400.

The Jesuits came to Zagreb at the city's request in 1606 to establish a secondary school (called variously a high school, college or gymnasium). They were given the deserted Dominican monastery on Katarinin trg 5 by the south town wall of the Upper Town, a building which they adapted and extended several times as the school grew. On 3 June 1607, they began here with 260 students the Classical Gymnasium (Klasicna Gimnazija), the oldest secondary school in Croatia and in southeastern Europe, and it has been in operation ever since. At the Suppression in 1773, the gymnasium became a state school. More

St. Catherine Church and the Jesuit Residence, Zagreb

CROATIA, 1995, the 350th anniversary of the Jesuit residence in Zagreb, Scott 231
The facade of St. Catherine's is to the right of the image

 
AUSTRIA, 2006, personalized stamp arranged by the Croatian Philately Club as part of a celebration in Vienna on 4 November 2006
The photograph of the upper city shows (see detail) to the left, the church of St. Catherine with its tower,
and to the right, the former Jesuit school at Zagreb, which now houses the Klovicevi Dvori Gallery at 4 Jesuit Square

In 1620 the Jesuits began to build a magnificent baroque church, St. Catherine's, to replace a smaller chapel of the same name. It was not completed until 1632. In 1641 they began their own residence adjacent to the church, at least one wing of which was completed in 1645 — the event apparently commemorated by Croatia in 1995. The residence, however, and the church were destroyed in the great fire of 1674, and were not reconstructed until the 18th century.

The University of Zagreb
The National University Library of Zagreb

 
CROATIA, 1994, the 325th anniversary of the founding of the University, Scott 187
the seal of Leopold, the vice-chancellor's chain of office, and a University building
CROATIA, 2007, the 400th anniversary of the National University Library, showing the facade of the old and new NUL buildings

In 1662 within the academic halls of the Classical Gymnasium there began a Jesuit Academy, the Neoacademia Zagrabiensis, offering courses eventually in philosophy, theology and law. On September 23 of 1669 Leopold I, the Holy Roman Emperor and the King of Hungary and Croatia, granted this academy formal university status. This was the first beginnings of the University of Zagreb, the oldest university in Croatia and the rest of Southeastern Europe. It was run by the Jesuits until their suppression in 1773. After the suppression it became the Royal Academy of Sciences with the three faculties mentioned above, and after some further transformation was officially designated the University of Zagreb in 1874. More

The library was founded in 1607 as the library of the Jesuit's first school in Zagreb. It became the library of the academy and then of the university, was opened to the public, and finally was named the national library. More

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