1.
Glossary of vexillology
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Flag terminology is the nomenclature, or system of terms, used in vexillology, the study of flags, to describe precisely the parts, patterns, and other attributes of flags and their display. Badge A coat of arms or simple heraldic symbol, canton Any quarter of a flag, but commonly means the upper hoist quarter, such as the field of stars in the flag of the United States or the Union Jack in the Australian Flag. Charge A figure or symbol appearing in the field of a flag, emblem A device often used as a charge on a flag. It may be heraldic in origin or modern, for example the maple leaf on the Canadian Flag, field The background of a flag, the color behind the charges. Fimbriation A narrow edging or border, often in white or gold, for example the white and gold lines of the South African Flag. Fly The half or edge of a flag farthest away from the flagpole and this term also sometimes refers to the horizontal length of a flag. Hoist The half or edge of a flag nearest to the flagpole and this term also sometimes refers to the vertical width of a flag. Length The span of a flag along the side at right angles to the flagpole, width The span of a flag down the side parallel to the flagpole. Flags often inherit traits seen in traditional European heraldry designs and as a result patterns often share names, banderole or bannerol A small flag or streamer carried on the lance of a knight, or a long narrow flag flying from the mast-head of a ship. Banner Generically, a synonym for a flag of any kind, in heraldry, a flag whose design is the same as the shield in a coat of arms, but usually in a square or rectangular shape, also known as a banner of arms. Burgee A distinguishing flag of a recreational boating organisation, Civil ensign, merchant flag or merchant ensign A version of the national flag flown by civil ships to denote nationality. Civil flag A version of the flag flown by civilians on non-government installations or craft. Colour or color The flag of a military unit, courtesy flag or courtesy ensign A flag flown by a visiting ship in foreign waters as a token of respect. Ensign The flag of a ship or military unit, may also be used generically as a synonym for a flag of any kind. Fanion A small flag used by the French military, gonfalon, gonfanon or gonfalone A type of heraldic flag suspended from a crossbar. Guidon A small flag borne by a military unit, in Scots heraldry, a smaller version of the Standard. Pennon or pennant A flag larger at the hoist than at the fly, pipe banner A decorative flag for the Scottish Highland bagpipes. Prayer flag A type of flag found strung along mountain ridges and peaks in the Himalayas, rank flag or distinguishing flag The flag flown by a superior naval officer on his flagship or headquarters
2.
National flag
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A national flag is a flag that symbolizes a country. The flag is flown by the government, but usually can also be flown by citizens of the country, historically, flags originate as military standards, used as field signs. The practice of flying flags indicating the country of origin outside of the context of warfare became common with the flag, introduced during the age of sail. Most countries of Europe adopted a flag in the course of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The specifications of the flag of Denmark were codified in 1748, the flag of Switzerland was introduced in 1889, also based on medieval war flags. The Netherlands introduced two national flags in 1813, the Ottoman flag was adopted in 1844. Other non-European powers followed the trend in the late 19th century, the flag of Japan being introduced in 1870, the Flag of the United States is not defined in the constitution but rather in a separate Flag Resolution passed in 1777. Minor design changes of national flags are passed on a legislative or executive level. A change in national flag is due to a change of regime. In such cases, the origins of the national flag. In such cases national flags acquire the status of a political symbol, the flag of Germany, for instance, was a tricolour of black-white-red under the German Empire, inherited from the North German Confederation. The Weimar Republic that followed adopted a black-red-gold tricolour, nazi Germany went back to black-white-red in 1933, and black-red-gold was reinstituted by the two successor states, West Germany and East Germany following World War II. Similarly the flag of Libya introduced with the creation of the Kingdom of Libya in 1951 was abandoned in 1969 with the coup led by Muammar Gaddafi. It was used again by National Transitional Council and by anti-Gaddafi forces during the Libyan Civil War in 2011 and officially adopted by the Libyan interim Constitutional Declaration. There are three types of national flag for use on land, and three for use at sea, though many countries use identical designs for several of these types of flag. On land, there is a distinction between civil flags, state flags, and war or military flags, state flags are those used officially by government agencies, whereas civil flags may be flown by anyone regardless of whether they are linked to government. War flags are used by organisations such as Armies, Marine Corps. In practice, many countries have identical flags for these three purposes, national flag is used as a vexillological term to refer to such a three-purpose flag
3.
Naval ensign
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Naval ensign is the ensign used by Navy vessels to denote nationality. It can be the same or different from the civil ensign and its also known as the war ensign. A large version of the naval ensign which is flown on a warships mast just before going into battle is called a battle ensign, the ensign differs from the jack which is flown from a jackstaff at the bow of a vessel. Most countries have one national flag and ensign for all purposes. In other countries, a distinction is made between the flag and the civil, state and naval ensigns. Some naval ensign differ in shape from the flag, such as the Nordic naval ensigns which have tongues. Naval ensigns that are different from the ensign and the national flag
4.
Tricolour (flag)
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A tricolour or tricolor is a type of flag or banner design with a triband design which originated in the 16th century as a symbol of republicanism, liberty or indeed revolution. One of the most famous tricolour, known as Le Tricolore, is the flag of France adopted in the French Revolution. The green-white-red tricolour remained a symbol of republicanism throughout the 19th century and was adopted as national flag by a number of following the Revolutions of 1848. It was also adopted by the Kingdom of Sardinia and this flag was a symbol of opposition against the German Kleinstaaterei and the desire for German Unification. It was at first illegal in the German Confederation, but was adopted as the flag at the Frankfurt Parliament of 1848/9. The flag of Belgium was introduced in a context, in 1831. The first national flag of the New World inspired by this symbolism was the flag of Mexico, the Pan-Arab colors adopted in Arab nationalism 1916 are a comparable concept, even though they combine four, not three, colours. The Indian independence movement in 1931 also adopted a tricolour in the symbolism of national unification and republican self-rule. In 1999, a red, green, and blue tricolour was proposed as the Flag of Mars, the design symbolizes liberty, and also the terraforming of Mars by humanity from a red planet to a green one, and eventually an Earth-like blue one. List of countries by style of national flags Fin flash on military aircraft, sometimes in a tricolor form Triband
5.
White
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White is an achromatic color, a color without hue. An incoming light to the eye that stimulates all its three types of color sensitive cone cells in nearly equal amounts results in white. White is one of the most common colors in nature, the color of sunlight, snow, milk, chalk, limestone, in many cultures white represents or signifies purity, innocence, and light, and is the symbolic opposite of black, or darkness. According to surveys in Europe and the United States, white is the color most often associated with perfection, the good, honesty, cleanliness, the beginning, the new, neutrality, and exactitude. In ancient Egypt and ancient Rome, priestesses wore white as a symbol of purity, in the Middle Ages and Renaissance a white unicorn symbolized chastity, and a white lamb sacrifice and purity, the widows of kings dressed in white rather than black as the color of mourning. It was also used in 20th century modern architecture as a symbol of modernity, simplicity. White is an important color for almost all world religions, the Pope, the head of the Roman Catholic Church, has worn white since 1566, as a symbol of purity and sacrifice. In Islam, and in the Shinto religion of Japan, it is worn by pilgrims, in Western cultures and in Japan, white is the most common color for wedding dresses, symbolizing purity and virginity. In many Asian cultures, white is also the color of mourning, the white color on television screens and computer monitors is created with the RGB color model by mixing red, green and blue light at equal intensities. The word white continues Old English hwīt, ultimately from a Common Germanic *χwītaz also reflected in OHG wîz, ON hvítr, the root is ultimately from Proto-Indo-European language *kwid-, surviving also in Sanskrit śveta to be white or bright and Slavonic světŭ light. The Icelandic word for white, hvítur, is derived from the Old Norse form of the word hvítr. Common Germanic also had the word *blankaz, borrowed into Late Latin as *blancus, the antonym of white is black. Some non-European languages have a variety of terms for white. The Inuit language has seven different words for seven different nuances of white, Japanese has six different words, depending upon brilliance or dullness, or if the color is inert or dynamic. White was one of the first colors used in art, the Lascaux Cave in France contains drawings of bulls and other animals drawn by paleolithic artists between 18,000 and 17,000 years ago. Paleolithic artists used calcite or chalk, they sometimes as a background, sometimes as a highlight, along with charcoal and red, in ancient Egypt, white was connected with the goddess Isis. The priests and priestesses of Isis dressed only in white linen, in Greece and other ancient civilizations, white was often associated with mothers milk. In Greek mythology, the chief god Zeus was nourished at the breast of the nymph Amalthea, in the Talmud, milk was one of four sacred substances, along with wine, honey, and the rose
6.
Blue
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Blue is the colour between violet and green on the optical spectrum of visible light. Human eyes perceive blue when observing light with a wavelength between 450 and 495 nanometres, which is between 4500 and 4950 ångströms. Blues with a frequency and thus a shorter wavelength gradually look more violet, while those with a lower frequency. Pure blue, in the middle, has a wavelength of 470 nanometers, in painting and traditional colour theory, blue is one of the three primary colours of pigments, along with red and yellow, which can be mixed to form a wide gamut of colours. Red and blue mixed together form violet, blue and yellow together form green, Blue is also a primary colour in the RGB colour model, used to create all the colours on the screen of a television or computer monitor. The clear sky and the sea appear blue because of an optical effect known as Rayleigh scattering. When sunlight passes through the atmosphere, the wavelengths are scattered more widely by the oxygen and nitrogen molecules. An optical effect called Tyndall scattering, similar to Rayleigh scattering, explains blue eyes, distant objects appear more blue because of another optical effect called atmospheric perspective. Blue has been used for art and decoration since ancient times and it is the most important color in Judaism. In the Middle Ages, cobalt blue was used to colour the stained glass windows of cathedrals, beginning in the 9th century, Chinese artists used cobalt to make fine blue and white porcelain. Blue dyes for clothing were made from woad in Europe and indigo in Asia, in 1828 a synthetic ultramarine pigment was developed, and synthetic blue dyes and pigments gradually replaced mineral pigments and vegetable dyes. Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Vincent van Gogh and other late 19th century painters used ultramarine and cobalt blue not just to depict nature, in the late 18th century and 19th century, blue became a popular colour for military uniforms and police uniforms. In the 20th century, because blue was associated with harmony, it was chosen as the colour of the flags of the United Nations. Surveys in the US and Europe show that blue is the colour most commonly associated with harmony, faithfulness, confidence, distance, infinity, the imagination, cold, and sometimes with sadness. In US and European public opinion polls it is the most popular colour, Blue is the colour of light between violet and green on the visible spectrum. Blues also vary in shade or tint, darker shades of blue contain black or grey, darker shades of blue include ultramarine, cobalt blue, navy blue, and Prussian blue, while lighter tints include sky blue, azure, and Egyptian blue. Today most blue pigments and dyes are made by a chemical process, the modern English word blue comes from Middle English bleu or blewe, from the Old French bleu, a word of Germanic origin, related to the Old High German word blao. In heraldry, the azure is used for blue
7.
Red
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Red is the color at the longer-wavelengths end of the spectrum of visible light next to orange, at the opposite end from violet. Red color has a predominant light wavelength of roughly 620–740 nanometers, light with a longer wavelength than red but shorter than terahertz radiation and microwave is called infrared. Red is one of the secondary colors, resulting from the combination of yellow. Traditionally, it was viewed as a primary colour, along with yellow and blue, in the RYB color space and traditional color wheel formerly used by painters. Reds can vary in shade from light pink to very dark maroon or burgundy. Red is the color of cyan. In nature, the red color of blood comes from hemoglobin, the red color of the Grand Canyon and other geological features is caused by hematite or red ochre, both forms of iron oxide. It also causes the red color of the planet Mars, the color of autumn leaves is caused by pigments called anthocyanins, which are produced towards the end of summer, when the green chlorophyll is no longer produced. One to two percent of the population has red hair, the color is produced by high levels of the reddish pigment pheomelanin. Since red is the color of blood, it has historically been associated with sacrifice, danger, modern surveys in the United States and Europe show red is also the color most commonly associated with heat, activity, passion, sexuality, anger, love and joy. In China, India and many other Asian countries it is the color of symbolizing happiness, since the 19th century, red has also been associated with socialism and communism. The word red is derived from the Old English rēad, the word can be further traced to the Proto-Germanic rauthaz and the Proto-Indo European root rewdʰ-. In Sanskrit, the word means red or blood. In the Akkadian language of Ancient Mesopotamia and in the modern Inuit language of Inuit, the words for colored in Latin and Spanish both also mean red. In Portuguese the word for red is vermelho, which comes from Latin vermiculus, in the Russian language, the word for red, Кра́сный, comes from the same old Slavic root as the words for beautiful—красивый and excellent—прекрасный. Thus Red Square in Moscow, named long before the Russian Revolution, in heraldry, the word gules is used for red. Red can vary in hue from orange-red to violet-red, and for each hue there is a variety of shades and tints. Red hematite powder was found scattered around the remains at a grave site in a Zhoukoudian cave complex near Beijing
8.
Coat of arms of Slovenia
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Above Mount Triglav, there are three golden six-pointed stars. It was designed in 1991 by Marko Pogačnik and adopted on 24 June 1991, until the dissolution of Austria-Hungary, the Slovene Lands did not have a coat of arms representing the whole nation, instead it had a different coat of arms for every land. When the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs merged with Kingdom of Serbia, Slovenia got the first real coat of arms, which actually was a heavily modified one from the Serbian Kingdom. The coat of arms presents the Serbian shield with cross on the left. An image of the royal Yugoslav coat of arms can be seen on the 10-Yugoslav dinar banknote of 1926, the coat of arms of the Socialist Republic of Slovenia was designed by Branko Simčič on the basis of the symbol of the Liberation Front of the Slovene Nation. The sea and the mount Triglav motive appeared in the coat of arms of the Socialist Republic of Slovenia, the former coat of arms was rounded by wheat with linden leaves and featured a red star at the top. There was also the coat of arms which presented Yugoslavia as a whole. The tender for the design of the new coat of arms of Slovenia was published in May 1991 and it was won by Marko Pogačnik. He based his design on the understanding of Slovenia as an entity and on the work by France Prešeren. In regard, to Prešeren, the coat of arms depicts the description of given by the poet in his epic-lyric poem The Baptism on the Savica. Pogačniks design was proclaimed the new coat of arms of Slovenia with the constitutional amendment C100. The designer, Marko Pogačnik, has described the coat of arms as a cosmogram, according to Pogačnik, the Triglav symbolises the male principle. There are two white bending lines below it, representing the Triglav Lakes Valley and the Slovene sea and rivers in general, above Triglav, there are three golden, six-pointed stars, forming a triangle and symbolising democracy. The stars are taken from the coat of arms of the Counts of Celje and its usage is regulated by the Act Regulating the Coat-of-Arms, Flag and Anthem of the Republic of Slovenia and the Flag of the Slovene Nation, published in the Official Gazette in 1994. The coat of arms of the Republic of Slovenia has been criticised by the herald Aleksander Hribovšek as heraldically lacking in a number of views, for example, he has stated that it has no official blazon, and its form of shield is not heraldically recognised. Mount Triglav and the sea are represented incorrectly, and he criticised the choice of Triglav as a symbol, media related to Coat of arms of Slovenia at Wikimedia Commons
9.
Civil ensign
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Civil ensign is the ensign used by civilian vessels to denote nationality. It can be the same or different from the state ensign and its also known as the merchant ensign or merchant flag. Some countries have civil ensigns for yachts, and even for specific yacht clubs. Most countries have one national flag and ensign for all purposes. In other countries, a distinction is made between the flag and the civil, state and naval ensigns. The civil ensigns that are different from the flag can be grouped into a number of categories. Several countries use red flags with, in most cases, either the national flag or the Union Flag in the canton. British overseas territories fly the plain Red Ensign or a Red Ensign with the colonial arms in the fly. Saudi Arabia puts its national flag in the canton of an otherwise-green flag, Ghana stopped using its Red Ensign in 2003 with the adoption of a new merchant shipping act, which made the Ghanaian flag the proper national colors for Ghana ships. Similarly, Sri Lanka stopped using its Red Ensign in 1969, several countries have civil ensigns that are very different from the national flag, for instance Malta and Luxembourg. Well-known examples are the Italian civil ensign showing the shield with the arms of the sea republics or the Polish civil ensign with the arms of Poland, most of these emblems were added to distinguish the ensign from similar flags of other countries or from other signal flags. In several countries there are two versions of the flag, a simpler one and a more elaborate one with the national arms. The simpler one is used as ensign, whereas the version with the arms is mainly used by the government. In Spain and Argentina the flag without the arms is only a variant for civil use, in El Salvador, the civil ensign also differs from the national flag in the proportions. France is a case, the overall proportion is the same. Civil and merchant ensigns Civil air ensign
10.
Ensign
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Ensign is the national flag flown on a vessel to indicate nationality. The ensign is the largest flag, generally flown at the stern of the ship, the naval ensign, used on warships, may be different from the civil ensign or the yacht ensign. Large versions of naval ensigns called battle ensigns are used when a warship goes into battle, the ensign differs from the jack which is flown from a jackstaff at the bow of a vessel. In its widest sense, an ensign is just a flag or other standard, the European military rank of ensign, once responsible for bearing a units standard derives from it. In contrast, the Arab rank of ensign, liwa, derives from the command of a unit or units with an ensign, not the carrier of such a units ensign, and is a general officer. In Arab armies, ensign is a title equivalent to a Western brigade. In nautical use, the ensign is flown on a ship or boat to indicate its appartenance, while this includes its nationality, it may well indicate more information rather than being the national flag itself. This is particularly common for commonwealth and European countries, ensigns are usually at the stern flagstaff when in port, and may be shifted to a gaff or mast amidships when the ship is under way, becoming known as a steaming ensign. Vexillologists distinguish three varieties of a national flag used as an ensign, A civil ensign is worn by merchant. In some countries the yacht ensign, used on boats or ships instead of merchant vessels. A state ensign or government ensign is worn by government vessels, a naval ensign is used by a countrys navy. Such ensigns are strictly regulated and indicate if the vessel is a warship, a merchant ship, several Commonwealth countries national flags had their origin in the ensigns of their original colonising power, the United Kingdom. Most notable of these flags are those of Australia, New Zealand. It is also likely that the original design from which the flag of the United States developed was strongly influenced by the British Red Ensign or the flag of the East India Company. With the creation of independent air forces and the growth in aviation in the first half of the 20th century. These may be divided into air force ensigns and civil air ensigns, in heraldry, an ensign is the ornament or sign, such as the crown, coronet, or mitre, borne above the charge or arms. Distinguishing mark Maritime flag Znamierowski, Alfred, the world encyclopedia of flags, The definitive guide to international flags, banners, standards and ensigns
Flag used by Slovenian Partisans that was adopted on 26 September 1941 at the Stolice meeting of the Yugoslav Partisans.
Flag Proposal in 1990 before independence by the 
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Naval Jack of the Republic of Slovenia (1996–present). The colors used in the jack are taken from the Coat of Arms of Slovenia.[9]
