The statue of Ban Josip Jelacic is located on Ban Jelacic Square, which is the main square in Zagreb. The square is the heart of the city and the main meeting place of the townspeople. There is a fountain on it, to which the legend of the origin of the city's name is attributed.
The statue of Ban Jelacic on a horse is the work of the Austrian sculptor Anton Ferenkor. The statue was erected and ceremoniously opened to the public in 1866. The statue is considered the first public sculpture in Zagreb. Its construction had been planned since 1854, but at that time there was great financial poverty in Croatia. Funds for the statue were collected through numerous donations. The installation of the statue began on October 19, but then the ceremony was postponed to December 17, 1866. The inhabitants of Zagreb and Croatia thus paid back their ban for all his services, which he did for the Croatian nation in the stormy year of 1848. The statue of ban Jelacic was removed from the square in 1947 by the communist government at the time without any explanation and in secret. The statue was returned to its original place with a great ceremony on October 16, 1990, the birthday of Ban Josip Jelacic. Today the statue faces south, but when it was first erected, it faced north – Hungary. The model for the horse was the sculptor Ferenkor's ban's horse Emir, a white Arab race, on which ban Josip Jelacic (1801-1859) rode to the enthronement in Zagreb in 1848.
Josip Jelacic Buzimski was a general and Croatian ban from 1848 to 1859. He was a member of the noble Jelacic family and also held the title of count. In 1848, he abolished serfdom and called the first elections in the Croatian parliament. In Croatia, he is famous as a national hero.