Drawing of Mount Bjelašnica

Drawing in pencil by Arthur Evans of wooded scenery, identified as a view (looking south-south-west) of Mount Bjelašnica, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Artist: Arthur John Evans
Date of drawing: August 1875
Continent: Europe
Geographical area: Southern Europe
Country: Bosnia and Herzegovina
Region/Place: Bjelašnica
Format: Drawing
Size: 82 x 137 mm
Acquisition: Joan Evans. Donated August 1941

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Primary documentation: ‘[p.588] Dr. JOAN EVANS, from the property of the late SIR ARTHUR EVANS, Youlbury, Boars Hill, Oxford. [List of items follows]’; ‘[p.590] 21 Original pencil sketches, types & scenery. BALKANS’: Pitt Rivers Museum accession records (Donations X, 1937–1941), pp.588, 590. Annotations on drawing: ‘S. S. W.’ (written in pencil below drawing).

Research notes: It has been identified by Philip Grover that this original drawing was used as the artwork for a woodcut engraving subsequently published in Arthur J. Evans, Through Bosnia and the Herzegóvina on Foot during the Insurrection, August and September 1875 (London, 1876), p.296, printed with the caption ‘Mount Bielastica’. Evans recorded in the volume: ‘We now wanted to make our way into the Narenta valley over the north-west shoulder of Mt. Bielastica, but were turned out of our course by the deep gorge of the Priesnica, and thought it best to ascend the south-eastern promontory of a largish range known by the name of Mt. Igman - though the title covers a multitude of peaks. The scenery now became more beautiful than ever, though profoundly lonely, save here and there for a beautiful black squirrel leaping from branch to branch, or a huge brown vulture floating through the azure overhead’: Through Bosnia and the Herzegóvina on Foot, p.295. Note that ‘Mount Bielastica’ refers to Mount Bjelašnica, Bosnia and Herzegovina.