United Kingdom without Scotland [fictional]

September 18th, 2014. That day, Scotland had the change to vote for its independence from United Kingdom, in a referendum. In the breakfast of the next day, the votes count confirmed the "No". However, in the upcoming weeks, there were many predictions about a hypothetic United Kingdom without Scotland, including the flags.

Among those flags, one of the most commonly found was the following:


How is this design done? Pick the current flag and remove the blue. But, differently from popular knowledge, it's not 100% free of "Scottishness".

As I antecipated in this article, the strange look of St. Patrick's cross (the red saltire i.e. diagonal cross) is due to its merge with Scottish St. Andrew's cross. What a parcel of media forgot was that, without Scottish saltire, the flag would look like this:


This layout is, by far, bolder and more equilibrated. Obviously, many other design could be taken into consideration, and media did it; some of them kept the blue, others added elements to Wales and, more rarely, Cornwall.

Comments are welcome!

Tonga

If you had to choose a flag to be used forever, unchanged, how would it look like? Tonga made its choice already.

This is the flag of Tonga:


Since the 1840s, European missionaries arrived in the islands with the goal of converting the natives to Christianity. They were successful: according to last census, more than 90% of the population profess a branch of this religion.

When the first king of Tonga converted to Methodism, he adopted a flag consisting of a red cross on a white field, representing purity.

The flag was changed in 1866, putting the old flag as a canton of the red field, representing the Blood of Christ shed on crucifixion. A reason commonly attributed to the change was the fact it was identical to the White Cross' flag, adopted by the Geneva Conventions two years earlier. It's not clear if the similarity with a British red ensign was intended or not, since Tonga was then a British protectorate.

According the current Tonga constitution act, from 1875, this flag "can never be altered" and "shall always be the flag". Obviously, the flag could be changed after a new constitution. As this flag doesn't have political signs, the only reasons I can think to replacing it is either Christianism losing relevance on the country or people bore with this bold and elegant design. None of them seems near to happen, so it's a good bet if this flag lasts forever...

Comments are welcome!

Gibraltar (United Kingdom)

The flag of Gibraltar is one of most curious cases of symbolic transfer. It's currently carried as a strong symbol of loyalty to the British crown (as you can see on these photos), what strongly contradicts its historical origins.

This is the flag of Gibraltar:


This flag is a banner of arms (a rectangular version of a coat of arms) of Gibraltar. Although confirmed by the College of Arms after the English conquest of the rock, the original grant of arms was made by Queen Isabella the Catholic, of Castile, commemorating the Spanish "re-conquest" of the place.

And the coat of arms and, consequently, the flag, is emerged in Spanish symbolism: the castle is pun on "Castile" and the biggest symbol of that kingdom, now part of Spain. The key represents the nickname of "key of Spain", although this metaphor has its origins at the time the Arabs still controlled the rock.

The most ironic thing on this flag becoming a symbol of loyalty to the British crown, in my opinion, is the fact that the Spanish never stopped using it as their own symbol. At the English takeover of the rock, most of Spanish residents of Gibraltar moved to a recently-established city called San Roque (notice the pun on "St. Rock"). As most of San Roque's earlier government was strongly linked to Spanish Gibraltarian one, they kept using the coat of arms, and now fly this flag:


A "Gibraltarian" flag with a Spanish crown. Yes, this is something that would cause much confusion to an unsuspecting.

Comments are welcome.

Namibia

How many persons in the world had the luck of designing not one, but two national flags, from two different countries? Frederick Brownwell, that served for almost twenty years as South African state herald, had this privilege and used it to create two of the most awesome national flags around the world.

Apart from being the chairman of the committee that chose Namibian national flag (the public submitted hundreds of entries), Brownwell designed the current South African flag. Clicking here, you can see my review about it.

Here is the current Namibian national flag:


At first sight, you can see some similarities with South African flag that Brownwell designed years after. One is use of many colors, all of them very contrasting with the neighbors. Other, more subtle, is that it incorporates colors from the flags of political parties, what's not uncommon in African continent: its basis is the flag of SWAPO, the main liberation party and that have ruled the country since its independence, but it's visible the similarities with the logo of a traditional opposition party, the DTA.

The colors can also be associated with common symbolism: red for the heroic people, white for peace and unity, blue for the sky and the waters, including Atlantic Ocean, green for the forests and agriculture. The yellow sun represents life and energy.

Long live Brownwell!

Comments are welcome!

Bonaire (Netherlands)

The island of Bonaire is a special municipality of Netherlands located in the Caribbean Sea. Its flag is possibly, one of the most successful created by a committee, that included, among others, the famous vexillologist Whitney Smith.

The final proposal of the committee, however, was other:


The compass rose represents the inhabitants of Bonaire, that came from the four corners of the world, and its navigators. The six-pointed star represents the its six "vicinities": Antriol, Nikiboko, Noord Salina, Playa (also known as Kralendijk), Rincon and Tera Cora. The top stripe was originally red, like the flag of the Kingdom of Netherlands but, because even the earlier proposals had a red emblem in the middle, it was substituted by yellow for avoid repeating colors, by a suggestion of committee leader, Franz Booi. This helped to fix the symbolism of the stripes: yellow for the sun and the nature (it's the color of many local flowers), white for peace and tranquility, and blue for the sea.

That flag, however, wasn't accepted by the government. Then, Whitney Smith suggested a public contest. More than a thousand entries were received. Neither one of the three finalists nor a combination of them was accepted by governement. But, when the original committee was reformed, the white-blue diagonal stripes, present in one of the finalists, was used to design the flag as we know today:


Even though yellow and white don't use to live well together on a flag, it's clearly a very appealing flag, with a very tropical look. I like the way that, despite the diagonal layout, the compass rose and star have a nice size and position, transforming them in a remarkable symbol.

And it's the way a committee, with a little help from the public, made this great flag!

Comments are welcome.

Netherlands [football]

Every time world turn its eyes to football (also known as soccer in North America), some questions arise: "Why Italy use blue?", "Why the Netherlands use orange?", etc. As the Netherlands are still alive in competition, I'll focus today on them.

The Netherlands use orange on his home jersey, and on the official KVVB (Royal Dutch Football Association) online shop, you can find a supporter flags similar to the image below. So, why the orange?

The answer is: this is the color of the House of Orange-Nassau, the royal house of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Although the Princes of Orange seems to have used the orange fruit as one of their symbols, orange was, curiously, the livery color of the House of Nassau. The original flag of Netherlands was orange-white-blue, but the first was gradually substituted by red along the years.

Several members of the House of Nassau appears on portraits with a orange bend, like this, representing Henry Casimir I of Nassau-Dietz, painted by Wybrand de Geest:

With the foundation of the House of Orange-Nassau, the orange color became a symbol of Dutch royal house. On the royal birthdays, for example, the national flag should fly with a orange pennant above, as a sign of allegiance:

With time, orange was turning from a royal color to a national color, and became a symbol of Dutch pride. Its use was specially remarkable during WW2, when the country was occupied by the Nazi.

You can return watching the World Cup now... Comments are welcome!

León (Spain)

In many posts from this blog, I've written about flags inspired by coats of arms. On this review, we'll look how curious can be the opposite phenomenon: a coat of arms based on a flag!

The kingdom of León's name comes from "legion", but the pun with "lion" was quickly noticed. While many European kingdoms were fughting the Crusades, the kingdom was fighting against the Moors in its own homeland. For use on the battlefields, the legions used a flag with a purple lion passant on white or light gray cloth, something like this:


As the use of the purple lion by León (first half of 12th century) predates the adoption of the fleurs-de-lis by France, lions by England and the pales by Aragon/Catalonia, it may be, possibly, the oldest royal symbol documented.

With the birth of heraldry, the purple lion would, naturally, fill a coat of arms. And here comes the most interesting part of this story! According to a study by Ricardo Chao Prieto, the Mediaeval idea of horror vacui ("fear of the empty") made the lion passant be rotated 90º degrees, what eventually made it a lion rampant. Look at the image:


Prieto's thesis has some merit: while the lion passant roughly feels one third of the escutcheon, the lion rampant occupies the full shield; England addopting three lions passant guardant may not be coincidence. And, although it may sound unintuitive, a lion rampant looks a lot like a lion passant rotated.

Currently, the flags most commonly used by Leonese nationalists have the coat of arms (the one with the, usually crowned, lion rampant) in a purple or crimson background. This flag arrangement wasn't used during Middle Ages, what points to a more recent origin. Similarly, the Spanish province and city of León currently use the silver shield with the purple lion rampant on background from red to purple.

Comments are welcome!

New Russia / Novorossiya, Russia (naval jack)

A new unrecognized nation, Novorossiya (literally, "New Russia"), appeared on Ukraine, claiming territories from Donetsk and Lugansk oblasts. According to current reports, it's unlikely to exist an official flag, but interesting proposals appeared on internet. I'll talk about two.

The first is from somebody nicknamed "arcktick". The photographs skillfully edited on Photoshop may have confused distracted Western sources, that often record them as widely used flags.

According to artist's page, the colors were chosen due to their wide use on Ukrainian oblast flags. Moreover, the flag can be obtained from combinations of Ukrainian and imperial and current Russian flags, as you can see below:

The second is the flag of New Russia Party, a Russophile Ukrainian flag behing the Novorossiya idea. Its flag, backed by many photographs, consists only of the white-blue-red of current Russian flag.

I've saw many Americans noticing the similarity between the flag above and the contemporary Confederate flag, but its most probable origin can be other: the Russian naval jack, below.

This flag consists of the union of St. George's and St. Andrew's cross, like the Great Britain flag, but on reverse order of colors. The naval jack was part of a set of flags designed by czar Peter I the Great himself. At the time, Peter I travelled to many European states, with the goal of forming an anti-Ottoman alliance (he failed) and modernizing Russia, and, on his stay on England, the Union ensign may have inspired him to create the Russian own jack.

But the flag, anyway, has a strong significance to Russia: St. Andrew, having preached along the Black Sea and region, is Russia's patron saint (curiously, Ukraine's, too), and St. George have been Moscow's city patron saint for centuries. The two saints also names important Russian military orders.

Comments (critiques, suggestions, corrections, additional info) is welcome.

Book Review: Flags Through the Ages and Across the World (Whitney Smith)

I've recently acquired the monumental Flags Through the Ages and Across the World (1975), by Whitney Smith, Ph.D. considered the founder of the "vexillology" (by the way, this word was created by him), the study of flags. It has more than 350 pages, 2257 artwork pieces made exclusively to the book, , featuring the masterpieces by Franz Coray, and many selected deluxe illustrations and photographs.

It's certainly among the best vexillology books ever written, and, although out-of-date and with minor errors, it's worth any money you can invest on it. The books excels both as a guide to vexillology and as a reference book.

This book is divided in some sections, and I'll describe them one by one.

Introduction (pages 7-31). Contains a brief introduction to the vexillology, and a very complete glossary of terms related to flags and heraldry.

Flags Through the Ages (pages 32-203). For its historiographic valor, the highlight of the book. This section tells the history of the flags since its ancestors ("vexilloids") from five millenia ago until the current usage, including sub-sections related to some historically relevant flags (like the standards of Charlemagne and Joan of Arc), the evolution of flag etiquette, the usage in many contexts (religious, military, naval, etc.) and timelines to some of most famous national flags.

Flags Accross the World (pages 204-303). Describes and explains the flags and coats of arms of all independent nations (and some subnational entities, when relevant) at the time of book conclusion. In the course of time, many of them became obsolete, but this section is yet a relevant text for reference. The section contains appendixes about international flags (like the United Nations and Red Cross) and flags of some ethnic and cultural minorities.

Symbols (pages 304-348). In a very original and intuitive layout, the section cites many flags with common symbols (geometric shapes, animals, plants, etc.) and patterns (the crescent and star, for example).

Alaska (USA)

Hey, Hollywood, what about a movie about the history of Alaskan flag. It has a rare history for a flag, and it happened on American territory... Well, I did my part.

The history of Alaskan flag starts with Benny Benson, a 13-years old boy with Aleutian blood. When he was three years old, his mother had died, and his father was forced to send his brother and him to orphanage. The year is 1927, and American Legion government is holding a government to decide the first Alaskan flag; more than 700 children from 7th to 12th grades submitted entries.


Benny didn't have doubts about what putting on the flags. The Big Dipper is the constellation that he looked at the sky every single night before sleeping, during all those years in the orphanage. The ratio of the flag, on his original words:

The blue field is for the Alaska sky and the forget-me-not, an Alaskan flower. The North Star is for the future state of Alaska, the most northerly in the union. The Dipper is for the Great Bear—symbolizing strength.

Benny's original design was quite similar to current flag, but had the "1867" inscription on it, that corresponds to the year of the American purchase of Alaska Territory from Russia. A modern reconstruction:


Winning the contest, he gained a US$1,000 prize, a watch and a trip to Washington, DC. He would only waste the money prize some years later, paying a professional course in diesel engines repair. Years on, he moved to Kodiak, Alaska to work as airplane mechanic; city's airport now holds his name.

Hope the history is worth the ticket... I mean, the reading. Comments are welcome!