BOSNIAN-RELATED AUSTRIAN SILVER BINDING.

(Austrian mark: 1872-1922)

Silver binding likely used to house prayer book or holiday machzor. Covers are decorated with symmetrical, stylized foliate motif and scrollwork flourishes, all etched with detail, surround central cartouche with Hebrew engraving: “Eliyahu Avrohom Ozmo, 5649.” Panneled spine in four compartments each with engraved floral ornament. Swing latch clasps, hinged joints. Marked: Dianakopf and maker’s mark: “JZ.”

Provenance: The Bosnian consignor relates that his non-Jewish grandmother’s sister, whose maiden name was Music, was married to Albert Abraham Ozmo (owner of this binding) from the city of Olovo, Bosnia. In 1941 the governing Ustaše regime deported Ozmo and his Gentile wife to the Jasenovac concentration camp in Croatia, where they were killed. Apparently the wife (Halima Music-Ozmo) never revealed that she was not in fact a Jew and chose to die with her Jewish husband. She likely gave the silver binding to her sister before she was arrested. The consignor explained that his grandparents were too overwhelmed to speak about this tragic chapter in their family’s history and he believes that no members of the Ozmo family (who stemmed from the Bosnian cities of Olovo, Tuzla and Sarajevo) survived the war. Another branch of Ozmos are from the Greek island of Corfu.