Talk:Coat of arms of Pennsylvania

Split proposal
While the current flag design is the coat of arms on a blue field, the COA has an extensive heraldic history separate from that of the flag, and the flag has modern vexillological history all its own.

Additionally, I believe the merging of these pages in 2013 was an error to begin with. "Flag of Pennsylvania" was created in 2004, and "Coat of arms of Pennsylvania" in 2011. They were merged into the COA page in 2013 because it was believed to be in line with other similar "seal on a bedsheet" flags that combined their pages. This is not the actual trend. 21 other "Seal on a bedsheet" flags still maintain separate pages for their flag and seal/COA (Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin) while only 6 other state flag pages merge them (Idaho, Illinois, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Virginia).

Flag of Kansas probably presents the best template of what this split could look like. It contains a section that discusses the state seal, while also linking to the main article about the seal.

Somewhat related, this may warrant the discussion of the merging of Coat of arms of Pennsylvania and Seal of Pennsylvania, which is a more common trend among state symbol pages.

Redirects
The existing page Flag and coat of arms of Pennsylvania is redirected to from several other names. These could be divided among the two new pages as follows:

“Virtue, liberty, and independence" > “Coat of arms of Pennsylvania”

“Pennsylvania flag" > “Flag of Pennsylvania”

"Flag of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania" > “Flag of Pennsylvania”

"Coat of Arms of Pennsylvania" > “Coat of arms of Pennsylvania”

Thank you for your consideration. TheTaraStark (talk) 15:34, 30 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Support - The flag and coat of arms are distinct entities with their own history, each of which warrants its own article. There is no need for a user seeking the vexillological significance of the flag to have to wade through the finer points of the seal itself, and vice versa. Littledrummrboy (talk) 15:41, 30 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Support - It is now a redirect in the infobox and elsewhere and does not need to, and should not, be. Also strongly agree with the points of User:Littledrummrboy above. Keystone18 (talk) 22:02, 1 October 2022 (UTC)