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Tuzla Canton (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

Tuzlanski kanton , Canton 3

Last modified: 2004-11-13 by dov gutterman
Keywords: bosnia and herzegovina | federation of bosnia and herzegovina | tuzla-podrinje | castle | pearl | fleur-de-lis | crescent | tuzla |
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by Zeljko Heimer, 2 October 2000



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Municipalities:


Tuzla Canton

Tuzla podrinje canton - Bosna i Hercegovina is an old name, new name is :  TUZLA CANTON, with new flag and Coat of Arms.
adi  Miralem , 1 April 2000

In Tuzla flag and Coat of Arms, what is shown as bright yellow should be green. I am waiting for the official construction sheet to be sent to me, and then maybe we shall have some more corrections. Why green? - simply, the Coat of Arms show in blue sky, the green hillside over a layer of coal and a layer of salt, both of the minerals being mined there for a long time.
Zeljko Heimer , 1 May 2000

There are two cantonal laws regualting the Coat of Arms and the flag, the first one establishing it and the second one regulating the usage:
1.  Zakon o grbu i zastavi Tuzlanskog kantona, 31. 12. 1999. Sluzbene novine Tuzlanskog kantona (SNTK) nr. ? - (effective on the day of issue in SNTK)
2. Zakon o upotrebi grba i zastave Tuzlanskog kantona, 31. 12. 1999. SNTK nr. ? - (effective on the day of issue in SNTK)
Both texts are quoted on <www.vladatk.kim.ba>, and these are the texts I used for this presentation:

"Tuzla Canton ("Tuzlanski kanton" in both official languages) is the new name for the "Canton III" of the Dayton agreement, that was called Tuzla-Podrinje Canton ("Tuzlansko-podrinjski kanton", "Tuzlansko-podrinjska z<upanija" in Bosnian and Croat respectivly) unil February 1999, when the name was changed to the curent one, due to the two facts - first, Drina river is not passing through it (Podrinje mbeing "near the Drina region") and second, the Constitutional count decided that "kanton" is official name for that kind of division in Croat language too.

The Coat of Arms of TK is described in article 3 of the law (1) named above as:
"The Coat of Arms of TK is in shape of a shield with yellow border. There are four excentric circular fields located in the Coat of Arms from top left [non heraldic description] towards bottom being blue, green, black and white. In the blue fields there are three yellow stars following the circular line formed by the edge of the blue and green fields."

Article 4 imidiately define the flag:
"The flag of TK is blue equal to the blue shade used in the Coat of Arms. In the geometric center of the flag there is the Coat of Arms of TK with additional eight stars set on the same circular path as the stars in the Coat of Arms, thus four stars towards top and four towards bottom of the flag. The flag is in rectangular shape. The ratio of the length and the width of the flag is 1:2."

Articles 5 and 6 determine that the technical details are in addition to this law, and are it part, and that there shall be a separate law regarding the use of the symbols. Article 7 provides the effect of the law with the day of issue in the official gazette. After the law there are captions in the text on the mentioned site from which it may be concluded that the images with construction sheets are issued in the official gazette, but unfortunately, the images are not included on the site.

The law (2) regardin the use of this symbols is more or less standard and there is little to report from it. It may be noted that in atrticle 16 it provides for the invalidation of a previous law regarding former flag of Tuzla-Podrinje Canton: "Zakon o utvroivanju i upotrebi grba i zastave Tuzlansko-podrinjskog kantona, Sluzbene novine Tuzlansko-podrinjskog kantona, nr. 4/96."

There is no reference in the laws on the possible meaning of the symbols, but it is quite obvious. Tuzla region is especially well known as the salt mining city and the white field is noz dbout refering to that. Coal is another mining product of importance of the region, the green is then the top layer of thje ground with vegetation and blue is the sky, quite logical. They yellow stars on blue are the reference to the national flag. The number of the stars probably have no particlar meaning as it is the case with the stars on the national flag, and that is further supported with the fact that there is more stars on the flag then on the Coat of Arms. However, the three stars on the Coat of Arms itself might possibly refer to the three main B&H ethnic groups.
Zeljko Heimer , 7 May 2000


Coat of Arms


by Zeljko Heimer, 2 October 2000


Municipalities of Tuzla Canton

All Tuzla Canton (Bosnia/Federation) municipalities now have Coat of Arms, and most have flags of their own. The "capital" city - Tuzla, hometown to yours truly, has had a flag for the last four or five years. It consists of the city's Coat of Arms in the canton - an image of which can be seen at the city's (as yet unfinished) webpage at <www.tuzla.ba> in white, representing salt, the city's namesake (tuz - turkish - salt), and it's basically a bicolour with 7:2 proportions of Bosnia-flag blue over Bosnia-flag yellow.
Muhamed Mesic, 13 November 2002


Former Tuzla-Podrinje Canton

[Tuzla-Podrinje Canton]
by Velid-aga Jerlagic and Jorge Candeias

[Arms of Tuzla-Podrinje Canton]
Coat of Arms
by Velid-aga Jerlagic and Jorge Candeias

I have an image of the flag of Tuzla-Podrinje canton on my pages that is in some details different. Most notably, I was informed that the outline of coat of arms and the crown are golden/yellow, rather than greenish as on Velid's image (but I have once seen it for a short second on TV and it might think that it was green). The shape of the crown on my image is based on oral description, and when I showed it to my 'informer' he said that it was OK. Maybe it was not. Some minor details of the coat of arms (size of squares and crescent, shape of the castle and "commas") are no doubt due to the artistic redention - I have no official image of the coat of arms, so I might presume that Velid's is more precise.
Zeljko Heimer, 13 April 1998

About the outline, I saw a flag of the canton a few days ago, in Tuzla, and the color seams to me as green, but it could also be "banana green-yellow" or something else. The crown is produced as seen on flag. I saw it with my own eyes. All other details are correct and accurate, again, as seen on the flag. The flag was outside of cantonal parliament. I guess they wouldn't wave an incorrect flag.
Velid-aga Jerlagic, 13 April 1998

I have a picture of that coat of arms, though in black and white, that I found in Ljiljan (Bosnian newspapers are easily available here in Germany). On my picture, the fleurs de lis are quite complete, in the sense that the bottom of the fleur is just touching the rest of the crown. I don't have a (green) line between the fleurs de lis and the pearls. These pearls are on my picture not pearls but little (white) squares forming an horizontal line. (I see clearly squares, it is not an impression). Then, there isn't again any (green) line between the pearls and the shield. On the shield, the upper square is bigger than the two others. The rest is identical, though the castle on my picture looks like a black paper hat. So what? Maybe there is a little difference between my black and white picture and the colour picture, the first being used for the publications and in the newspapers. My picture is in an official "Happy easter" ad made by the Tuzlansko Podrinjski Kanton.
Pascal Vagnat, 13 April 1998

When paying for ads in newspapers, cantons or municipalities rarely provide their own images for the people who do the desktop publishing work within the newspapers. So, the newspapers are forced to provide their own images based on oral or other descriptions. I believe that was the case in Ljiljan. My pictures are based on official documents.
Velid-aga Jerlagic, 13 April 1998


by Zeljko Heimer, 2 October 2000


Coat of Arms
by Zeljko Heimer, 2 October 2000

Regarding the previous flag and Coat of Arms they were adopted probably in 1996 (law is in oficial gazette number 4/96), but I am not sure as I do not have that document. The colour of the crown is calimed by Velid to be green, my informations are golden, but stilll I was unable to confirm it by any official document.
by Zeljko Heimer, 2 October 2000