Issue: 7 March 2001 (signature: Željko Rohatinski), released into circulation: 9 July 2001

Size: 122 x 61 mm

Main colour: green

Motif on the obverse: the portraits of the Croatian Duke Fran Krsto Frankopan (1643-1671) and the Croatian Viceroy (Ban) Petar Zrinski (1621-1671)

PETAR ZRINSKI AND FRAN KRSTO FRANKOPAN
Croatian Ban (Viceroy) Count Petar IV Zrinski, born in 1621 in Vrbovec, and Fran Krsto Frankopan, born in 1643 in Bosiljevo, were members of two powerful Croatian noble families. As skilled lords and politicians they held estates throughout Croatia, Slavonia, Dalmatia, and beyond. Prominent in the battles against the Ottomans, they also resisted Habsburg absolutism and centralism. Striving to create a unified Croatian language by merging three Croatian dialects, they founded the Ozalj literary-linguistic circle. History remembers them as the initiators of the Zrinski-Frankopan conspiracy in an effort to put an end to the absolutist power of the reigning Habsburgs. Their efforts failed - the conspirators were arrested and incarcerated in Wiener Neustadt, indicted for high treason. They were sentenced to death and executed on 30 April 1671 in the square in front of the town armoury.

Motif on the reverse: the keep of the Varaždin Castle (12th-16th century) and the ground plan of the Castle.

VARAŽDIN - OLD TOWN
Varaždin is first mentioned in 1181 in a written charter by King Bela III. Having suffered massive casualties in the Tatar invasion of 1242, Bela IV built a royal fortress which would become known as the Old Town. The fort permanently remained a self-contained feudal estate, independent of the free royal city of Varaždin, as it was proclaimed in 1209 by Andrew II Arpadović. The Gothic-Renaissance fortress has been owned by many noble families: the counts of Celje, Jan Vitovac and his sons, John Corvinus, Ivan Ungnad, Juraj Brandenburg and Croatian viceroy family Erdődy. From the strong medieval fortress surrounded by water-filled moats, the main fortress and armoury of Slavonian Krajina and Varaždin military headquarters to the beautiful Renaissance castle, its appearance has changed through the centuries.