There's a lot more going on with these national symbols than people realise.
What messages does a country's flag send? The obvious one is about ownership -that this bit of land (or building) belongs to this country. But there are in fact a lot of other - more subtle - messages sent by the world's flags. The BuffPo decided to take a closer look.
For a start, consider the curious fact that the US and UK flags are longer than nearly all the other nations’ flags.
Most of the world’s flags are in the proportions of 2:3, that is 2 units high to 3 units wide. But the British "Union Jack" is twice as long as it is high, a ratio of 1:2, while the US flag is officially a shade under (at 10:19), although there are in practice many variants. When a flag is wider, it tends to keep the same height and so is basically bigger. Is this a case of the USA and UK strutting on the world stage? Well, maybe. But the Irish flag is also 1:2, while one strange exception amongst the world's flags is Qatar whose flag is nearly three times as wide as it is high! (Its ratio is 11:28.)
The flag of Denmark is an outlier in the other direction: its flag is nearly a square (its aspect ratio is 14:17) with an off-centre cross said to represent a Christian crucifix tipped on its side, with its white colour representing 'purity' and the red surrounding it representing the Danish people’s battle for freedom.
Denmark’s 800-year-old flag is actually the oldest design in the world and set off a trend in Scandinavia, Finland, the Faroe Islands and Iceland for flags featuring off-centre crosses.
Another uncommon flag is that of Nepal, it is the only country to have a flag that is not a rectangle, it’s a complex arrangement of triangles - roughly made up of two, unequal triangles stacked on top of each other. These symbols are supposed to represent mountain peaks and the unusual flag is said to evoke the Himalayan mountain chain which dominates the country. Nepal also holds the record for having the shortest flag in the world as the flag is actually slightly higher than it is wide.
Triangles also appear in Qatar’s flag, but these ones have nothing to do with mountains, instead being something to do with the unifying of the local tribes. The flag is predominantly maroon with a white portion separated by 19 serrated teeth. For no obvious reason, the flag is extra long - almost three times wider than it is high (11:28). It was even longer for 22 years between 1949–1971. At this time its ratio was 11:30.
Meanwhile, Jamaica’s flag is the ONLY one in the world to not contain at least one of the colours: red, white and blue. Its flag is green, yellow and black. Originally, the government said that the colours - gold, black and green, represented the sun, hardship, and the land but this explanation was changed in 1996 to a more politically correct one, Now black represented the strength and creativity of a people that had allowed them to overcome great challenges, gold symbolised the wealth of the country as well as the sunshine, and green represented the lush vegetation - as well as hope.
There's plenty of symbolism in the Star Spangled banner but you might suspect the American flag is only red, white and blue because it was aping the colours of the British Union Jack, not least as it is known that in 1776, when the revolutionaries considered no less than 27 ideas for new flags, every single one used the British colours. But why the stripes? Something called the Marine Committee of the Second Continental Congress did stipulate that “the flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white, that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field – representing a new constellation”. (Thirteen being the original number of colonies/states.)
A grander explanation came from Charles Thompson, secretary to one of the early committees setting up the new United States, who offers a very grand explanation of the meanings of the colours: "White signifies purity (it always does) and innocence, Red, hardiness & valour, and Blue, vigilance, perseverance & justice."
That explanation contrasts with "the most average flag of the world", which is without a doubt, the flag of France. The French flag also features the three colours, red, white and blue, the three most common colours used in all the world's flags. At first, the colours symbolised the alliance of the king - white - with the colours of the revolutionary militia from the city of Paris - blue and red - but very soon the interpretation shifted and when a 1794 proclamation set out the colours of the French flag it explained that the three colours represented the king and nobility (white); the church and clergy (blue) and the "third estate", or what we nowadays call the working class (red).
France’s flag also has a 2:3 aspect ratio, one that is used by 85 states out of 200. The French flag also popularised tricolour flags, now the most frequent flag design of all, being used by over half of the world’s countries. All this makes le Tricolore a pretty good starting point if you want to design a new, but rather conventional, flag.
By our Geopolitics office in Domfront…
What messages does a country's flag send? The obvious one is about ownership -that this bit of land (or building) belongs to this country. But there are in fact a lot of other - more subtle - messages sent by the world's flags. The BuffPo decided to take a closer look.
For a start, consider the curious fact that the US and UK flags are longer than nearly all the other nations’ flags.
Most of the world’s flags are in the proportions of 2:3, that is 2 units high to 3 units wide. But the British "Union Jack" is twice as long as it is high, a ratio of 1:2, while the US flag is officially a shade under (at 10:19), although there are in practice many variants. When a flag is wider, it tends to keep the same height and so is basically bigger. Is this a case of the USA and UK strutting on the world stage? Well, maybe. But the Irish flag is also 1:2, while one strange exception amongst the world's flags is Qatar whose flag is nearly three times as wide as it is high! (Its ratio is 11:28.)
The flag of Denmark is an outlier in the other direction: its flag is nearly a square (its aspect ratio is 14:17) with an off-centre cross said to represent a Christian crucifix tipped on its side, with its white colour representing 'purity' and the red surrounding it representing the Danish people’s battle for freedom.
Denmark’s 800-year-old flag is actually the oldest design in the world and set off a trend in Scandinavia, Finland, the Faroe Islands and Iceland for flags featuring off-centre crosses.
Another uncommon flag is that of Nepal, it is the only country to have a flag that is not a rectangle, it’s a complex arrangement of triangles - roughly made up of two, unequal triangles stacked on top of each other. These symbols are supposed to represent mountain peaks and the unusual flag is said to evoke the Himalayan mountain chain which dominates the country. Nepal also holds the record for having the shortest flag in the world as the flag is actually slightly higher than it is wide.
Triangles also appear in Qatar’s flag, but these ones have nothing to do with mountains, instead being something to do with the unifying of the local tribes. The flag is predominantly maroon with a white portion separated by 19 serrated teeth. For no obvious reason, the flag is extra long - almost three times wider than it is high (11:28). It was even longer for 22 years between 1949–1971. At this time its ratio was 11:30.
Meanwhile, Jamaica’s flag is the ONLY one in the world to not contain at least one of the colours: red, white and blue. Its flag is green, yellow and black. Originally, the government said that the colours - gold, black and green, represented the sun, hardship, and the land but this explanation was changed in 1996 to a more politically correct one, Now black represented the strength and creativity of a people that had allowed them to overcome great challenges, gold symbolised the wealth of the country as well as the sunshine, and green represented the lush vegetation - as well as hope.
There's plenty of symbolism in the Star Spangled banner but you might suspect the American flag is only red, white and blue because it was aping the colours of the British Union Jack, not least as it is known that in 1776, when the revolutionaries considered no less than 27 ideas for new flags, every single one used the British colours. But why the stripes? Something called the Marine Committee of the Second Continental Congress did stipulate that “the flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white, that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field – representing a new constellation”. (Thirteen being the original number of colonies/states.)
A grander explanation came from Charles Thompson, secretary to one of the early committees setting up the new United States, who offers a very grand explanation of the meanings of the colours: "White signifies purity (it always does) and innocence, Red, hardiness & valour, and Blue, vigilance, perseverance & justice."
That explanation contrasts with "the most average flag of the world", which is without a doubt, the flag of France. The French flag also features the three colours, red, white and blue, the three most common colours used in all the world's flags. At first, the colours symbolised the alliance of the king - white - with the colours of the revolutionary militia from the city of Paris - blue and red - but very soon the interpretation shifted and when a 1794 proclamation set out the colours of the French flag it explained that the three colours represented the king and nobility (white); the church and clergy (blue) and the "third estate", or what we nowadays call the working class (red).
France’s flag also has a 2:3 aspect ratio, one that is used by 85 states out of 200. The French flag also popularised tricolour flags, now the most frequent flag design of all, being used by over half of the world’s countries. All this makes le Tricolore a pretty good starting point if you want to design a new, but rather conventional, flag.
By our Geopolitics office in Domfront…
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