Talk:National flag

Is "national flag" the best generic term
I'm not entirely sure "national flag" is the best generic term. What about the flag of the United Nations, the state of California, etc? --hajhouse

We should have a flag article to cover flags in general. (I see you've created one already.) But national flags are a particularly important type of flag, so it makes sense to have a separate article on them. --Zundark, 2001 Nov 1

Zundark: I'm not so sure about that. Is there anything particularly unique about national flags, as opposed to flags in general, that warrant particular treatment in their article? Maybe we could have a list of national flags here, but articles about the national flags per se really belong in the same article as discussion of other types of flags -- to separate them into a separate article is to ignore the continuity and unity of the subject matter. -- SJK

I'm not sure I see exactly what you are objecting to. I think we want to be able to link directly to an article on national flags, instead of having to link to a general article on flags. The article should explain what national flags are, and provide a list of Wikipedia articles on individual national flags. I don't see that this detracts from the general article on flags, which can still discuss any flags it wants to, including national ones. The list of well-known flags that is currently here should probably be moved to flag, since whether a flag is well-known or not is independent of whether or not it is a national flag. --Zundark, 2001 Nov 1

Well, the regulations for use of national flags, for instance. Such regulations exist not only for national flags, but for subnational and supranational flags as well. And since a large part of these regulations concern matters of precedence, even the regulations for national flags cover other flags also. Which is why I'd say the regulations should be moved to Flag, and expanded to discuss regulations in respect of sub- and super-national flags also. -- SJK

Yes, that's OK. But I won't be doing it, because I don't know enough about it. --Zundark, 2001 Nov 2

Please add Uighurstan or "East Turkestan", thanks. Also Tibet and South Mongolia — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.42.43.3 (talk • contribs) 19:28, 5 January 2003

I was rather hoping to see some historical info about the birth of the concept of national flags. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.117.14.5 (talk • contribs) 17:19, 17 March 2005

The state of the nation
This article is a mess because it confuses the term nation and state. Take the case of the UK. There is a Union Jack representing the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but England, Scotland and Wales are nations in the UK which is a state and each has a national flag.

The problem is that there is an assumption that Nation and State are interchangable. This is an idea from the U.S. and French Revolutions, but to anyone who lives in a nation which pre-dates those events: Nation, State and Sovereignty are constitutionally very different things.

In the case of the Commonwealth of Nations and more specifically the United Kingdom sovereignty does not lie with the nations but with the Crown (see also British monarchy). Think of all those costume dramas about Henry VIII and you start to understand how the constitution works in the UK. Ambassadors to the UK present their credentials directly to the sovereign at the Court of St. James's not to the Government of the United Kingdom. Only Commonwealth High Commissioners present their credentials to "to the United Kingdom," rather than to the Sovereign or her Court. The Parliament of the UK is the British Peoples' Parliament (English Civil War and specifically 1649) but because of the English Restoration in 1660 the Government of the United Kingdom is Her Majesty's Government.

Although this is a wander down the archic dusty corners of the British constitution it is important because it highlights that Sovereignty, State and Nation are not the same thing. PBS 09:21, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

ooo. Not to mention, there is already a Wiki page for: Gallery of sovereign state flags. This article should be about countries or "nations" with National Flags, this includes Scotland, Northern Ireland, England and Wales, these four are Nations and have National flags meaning they should have their separate flags here. This article is a sham — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.66.160.232 (talk) 12:48, 23 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Or maybe we should just take the gallery of flags out of this article. Jason A. Quest (talk) 12:54, 23 May 2020 (UTC)


 * That would be fair and stop many arguments, since there are many articles with sovereign/non sovereign flags and the gallery of flags on this article(and the title together) make it factually incorrect

the staus of Cornwall
Cornwall is not a nation, it is only a county. Superdantaylor 23:59, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Civilian use
I don't think it's really fair to say that a national flag can usually be used by citizens of the country. The flag usually considered "the national flag" isn't necessarily allowed to be used by civilians, and the article seems to cover national flags including government/war flags/ensigns anyway. JPD (talk) 12:53, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Widespread use of national flags
It would be nice to have something in here about the extent of national-flag use. In the U.S. and Canada, you see flags not just on government buildings but in school classrooms, aside office buildings and even on some private homes. Europeans seem only to get their flags out for soccer games. -- Mwalcoff 00:57, 14 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Er...have you ever been to Europe? It doesn't sound that way. Come to Denmark (or Scandinavia in general), and you'll see flags everywhere.
 * And it's football, not "soccer"... ;o) --Michael riber jorgensen 21:12, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

War flag
Until there is more to be said about war flags (in the sense of a distinct version of a national flag for military use on land), I don't see the justification for a separate War flag stub, and suggest that it get merged in to the "National flags on land" section here. --ScottMainwaring 15:15, 28 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Hmmm. I don't object to war flag as it is, or to merging it, but I do think it would be strange to have that level of detail here on war flags, but leave civil flag and state flag as separate articles. They currently don't have much more content than the war flag does. JPD (talk) 16:26, 28 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes, a bit strange, but I think this just reflects prevalence in "nature" -- there are lots of civil and state flags in current use, but almost no "war flags". --ScottMainwaring 12:13, 10 December 2006 (UTC)


 * No, I'm not saying that it would be strange to have articles for civil and state flags and not war flags (as you say, that distinction is more common, although the current articles don't really reflect that). I'm saying that it would be strange as a result of that for this article to contain a disproportionate amount of detail on war flags. JPD (talk) 11:42, 11 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I went ahead and expanded war flag, and removed the merge requests. --ScottMainwaring 00:25, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

danish flag
oldest national flag in use today?

what about scottish flag? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)
 * There are several claims to that title, but at any rate the article says the Danish flag is the oldest state flag still in use, not the oldest national flag. JPD (talk) 09:34, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
 * So the Danish flag is a state flag, but not a national flag? Udaller, 19:34, 29 August 2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Udaller (talk • contribs)
 * I said that the article did not claim that the Dannebrog is the oldest national flag. How in the world does that imply it is not a national flag? JPD (talk) 11:30, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

National flag article should mention national flags!
In response to a friend's query I discovered, a few weeks ago, that Denmark's flag was the oldest *state* flag, but Catalonia's was an older *national* flag. Returning to Flag article a week later, I discovered that reference to Catalonia's flag had been deleted!!!!

If my vote counts, I vote that "national flag" includes flags like Scotland's and Catalonia's but that's not the key point. Perhaps there's a better term for "national flag". BUT WHY IN THE NAME OF TARNATION did any idiot feel that it was appropriate to COMPLETELEY DELETE interesting and useful information about such flags just because they quibbled with the term "national flag"???????

Jamesdowallen 06:13, 1 November 2007 (UTC)


 * There may be some debate about what counts as a "national" flag, and which flag is actually oldest, and quite possibly the article should mention the claims of both Scotland and Catalonia to the oldest national flag, if there are reliable sources. However, the lead image should not be used as a battleground for these claims, with captions making simplistic statements. It is meant to illustrate the concept of a national flag and could easily be chosen by criteria other than age. There is no logical reason to add images of all the flags with similar claims to fame in the intro. If you look at the history, you will see that this is why the "information" was removed, not the term "national flag". JPD (talk) 11:39, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Gallery of country flags
There is a link on this article, under the 'see also' section entitled 'Gallery of country flags'. Naively, I expected it to link to a gallery of country flags. However, it links to a Gallery of sovereign-state flags. Why? What's wrong with showing the flags of all countries? Are they a secret? :) (Dai caregos (talk) 16:07, 20 June 2008 (UTC)).


 * Of course not. There are links for non-sovereign countries too: Flags of active autonomist and secessionist movements and Flags of formerly independent states. Also added Gallery of dependent territory flags, and removed the link to the redirected page. -- Jao (talk) 16:23, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Nation/country
It is fairly clear that flags of non-sovereign nations can be and are also called "national flags". The question, is how should this article deal with that fact. JPD (talk) 23:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The article on Nation clearly is not limited to sovereign nations only, so this one shouldn't be either. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 23:35, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I am fine with that, though let us look at the example of Quebec. Now, the Quebecois people have been recognized as a nation by the Canadian parliament.  The province of Quebec (which is the goegraphical region that hold the Quebecois, but also a number of other peoples, say anglo Quebeckers etc) has a flag as all Canadian provinces do.  Officially, this is the flag of QUebec, but would that be also considered the flag of the Quebecois nation?  Things are a little muddy here, for me anyway.  Dbrodbeck (talk) 23:59, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * This article should definitely not imply that the term "national flag" is limited to sovereign nations only. However, does this article exist, because the phrase "national flag" exists, or because it discusses things that are true of flags of sovereign states and not of flags in general? I believe the WP:POINT of the page move was that the article currently does not ostensibly or actually deal with the broader category of national flags, or even acknowledge them. I'm not sure what is the best way to do this while actually retaining the information not at flag. JPD (talk) 00:09, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
 * What does the term 'national flag' mean I guess is the question. Is the USA a 'nation'?  (I picked that one because it is pretty multicultural, some might say multinational). Dbrodbeck (talk) 00:40, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The usage of "national flag" to mean things like the Stars and Stripes is much more clear than "nation" to mean the USA. Apart from that, I don't think the only question is what does "national flag" mean. This is an encyclopedia, not a dictionary, and while the general meaning of terms must be at the very least acknowledged, articles with a coherent scope are better than those which follow all the meanings of a phrase. JPD (talk) 02:08, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I guess I should not have said 'the' question, probably 'an important' question. Dbrodbeck (talk) 02:49, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Personally I would create a second article called National flag (ethnicity) or some such for the uses such as flags for groups of people such as teh Quebecois. This page dispite its name clearly is about flags of countries. -Djsasso (talk) 14:27, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Proportions
I want to add a section on different proportions used, any objections? —Preceding unsigned comment added by N40798 (talk • contribs) 19:55, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Caption should these are UN members flags
In the map caption should be an explanation that those are UN members flags, hence missing e.g. Taiwan's flag. 82.141.72.194 (talk) 13:13, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Australian Flag - New Zealand Flag Differences.
Currently the article introduces this particular subject with the line "Also, Australia and New Zealand share a very similar flag...", and continues with this theme for four sentences. How do we measure the similarity of flags? If it is by the number of differences (changes required to transform on into t'other), then those two flags have some five (or so) differences (number of stars, star colors and positions). By comparison many European flags differ for the large part by only one stripe, one color, or orientation (compare Luxemburg, Russia, Romania, France, Austria, Ireland, Belgium, Germany, etc.). Would someone be able to clarify why the Australian/New Zealand flags are considered to be "very similar", while the European flags are not? Is this a case of the writers own exposure to (and hence being able to distinguish between) certain flags and their lack of knowledge of other flags, without justifying that the flags are objectively and in themselves more similar than other national flags? The four sentences written on the flags of these two countries seems to belittle the large number of much more similar European flags. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.99.15.119 (talk) 17:38, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Oldest national flag
I've just removed the following passage from the article:


 * The earliest national flags adopted for display of patriotism in a civilian context were those flown in the Republicanist American and French revolutions in the late 18th century. The oldest national flags that remain in use are thus the Flag of the United States (in the original 13-star version adopted in 1777), the French tricolour (adopted 1794), followed by the British Union flag (adopted 1801, based on a design of 1606, in turn based on the 16th-century flags of England and Scotland).

It has a few problems - firstly, as has been mentioned, the flag of Denmark dates back to 1219 according to its Wiki article, and many other flags (e.g. that of Scotland, which isn't an independent state but a country nonetheless) are older than that of the US. In any case, there was no reference given for these being the first three 'national flags', and the use of the word 'thus' seems to suggest that it is obvious based on the first sentence, which I can't see at all.

If anyone could clear this passage up, or find some references on what the oldest national flag is, then by all means put it into the article (it's certainly relevant), but I felt it couldn't stay as it was. Thanks, TheLewisRepublic (talk) 18:40, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Propaganda
Aren't flags essentially a form of propaganda? Not sure the correct word, but the main goal is to get people to be more patriotic to their country. --24.94.251.19 (talk) 07:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Unusual flags section
I have returned the hotlink to Republic of China to the section. I removed "Taiwan Republic" because that was certainly a new term to me. SiBr4, when you removed the hotlink you gave me a link to Republic of Formosa, that was a completely different state. The current situation for the island of Taiwan, as I'm sure everyone knows, is currently very complicated. For that reason, I feel it is appropriate to hotlink the current name of the state that controls the island, that being the "Republic of China". 17:28, 16 October 2012 (UTC)
 * The "Taiwan Republic" is the 1895 Republic of Formosa, not the present-day Republic of China. I removed the link to "Republic of China" because it redirects to Taiwan anyway, and there's already a link to that in the preceding sentence. SiBr4 (talk) 20:28, 16 October 2012 (UTC)
 * "Taiwan" and the "Republic of China" are two different entities, hence why I said the current situation is complicated. The article's subsection is talking about a national flag for the entity which controls the island, which is the Republic of China, atleast until/if they change their name. The Republic of Formosa, or the "Taiwan Republic" as you (and the article previously before I changed it) refer to it, is an entity that has not existed for a hundred years. Anyhow, the reason I hotlinked "Republic of China" is because the article also says "Taiwan" and I thought it went to the disambiguation, not the country. 23:34, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

Similarities table
In the Similarities section, I want to put a table of flags so you can see the differences like so:

I think it follows the Manual of Style, but I could be wrong. Anyone think this is a good idea? Vexzy (talk) 18:46, 16 August 2014 (UTC)


 * At least a better idea than stuffing the prose with flag icons like the 68.* IP repeatedly tried. Another idea would be to show some groups of flags at the right of the screen, like this. Either way I don't think we should show every set of tangentially similar flags or even every set of flags mentioned in the prose, but just some examples, like one set for each paragraph. Some sets with common colors or design have their own articles with the flags displayed anyway (Pan-African colors, Pan-Slavic colors, Pan-Arab colors, Nordic Cross flag). SiBr4 (talk) 21:05, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

Vertical display
The section "Hanging a flag vertically" is about flags that have special design for vertical hanging. Looking at the flags of Slovakia, Germany and Montenegro, they have their CoAs rotated to an upright position when the flag is vertical. In the flag of Turkey, however, the crescent and star are not rotated; the points of the crescent are always pointing away from the hoist. The word "rotate" is a bit ambiguous, and in the source for the Turkish it says that the star and crescent are rotated, but in that case it means that it is rotated with the flag. The Turkish flag belongs to the same group as most national flags, with the same relative placement of the elements whether the hoist is vertical or horizontal. --T*U (talk) 16:09, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Please look at the source I provided in the edit summary. because the site stipulates that the crescent star be rotated 90 degrees. this is a special modification exactly the same as the Philippines. why is that flag still there? Saudia arabia is the same too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JimPody (talk • contribs) 18:38, 18 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Is this really so difficult to understand? Let me try with teaspoons.
 * Look at the flag of Slovakia. The top of the coat of arms is pointing up. If that flag is displayed vertically (rotated 90 degrees clockwise), the top of the coat of arms would be pointing to the right. But that is not the correct way of vertical display. The coat of arms should be rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise, so that the top of the coat of arms again is pointing up, as you can see on this picture. This is a special modification.
 * Look at the flag of Liechtenstein. The top of the crown is pointing up. If that flag is displayed vertically (rotated 90 degrees clockwise), the top of the crown would be pointing to the right. But that is not the correct way of vertical display. The crown should be rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise, so that the top of the crown again is pointing up, as you can see on this picture. This is a special modification.
 * Look at the flag of Saudi Arabia. The text and the sword are horizontal. If that flag is displayed vertically (rotated 90 degrees clockwise), the text and sword would be vertical. But that is not the correct way of vertical display. The text and sword should be rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise, so that the text and sword again are horizontal, like here. This is a special modification.
 * Now look at the flag of Turkey. The points of the crescent are pointing right. If that flag is displayed vertically (rotated 90 degrees clockwise), the points of the crescent will be pointing down. And that is the correct way of vertical display. The article you have given the link to, also says so. This is not a special modification, but the way most flags are used: Just turn it.
 * Regarding the flag of the Philippines, that has nothing to do with this discussion. The special protocol for that flag is that it is always displayed with the reverse showing, that is with the blue to the left. (If just rotated 90 degrees clockwise, it would have the blue to the right.) The same is the case for Greece and the United States.
 * Another thing: Please learn how to sign your talk page entries. It is quite simple. You can read about it here. --T*U (talk) 07:07, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

Disruption by Vietnamese IP editor
Documenting here for ease of reference for page protection requests if the disruption continues, I'm only documenting from after this removal by at 03:43, 14 February 2020 which correctly removed "dependent territories and "other areas" because they aren't NATIONS".


 * 12:48, 16 February 2020. Adds "Flag of Bermuda" in a new "Tettories" [sic] section
 * 12:53, 16 February 2020. Adds "Flag of Anguilla" to the above section
 * 12:55, 16 February 2020. And "Flag of Aruba"
 * 00:32, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Bonaire"
 * 00:52, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of the British Virgin Islands" and "Flag of the Cayman Islands"
 * 00:54, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Curaco"
 * 01:00, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Greenland" and "Unofficial flag of Guadeloupe"
 * 01:03, 19 February 2020. And "Snake flag of Martinique"
 * 01:09, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Montserrat" and "Flag of Navassa Islands"
 * 01:16, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Puerto Rico"
 * 01:20, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Saba"
 * 01:28, 19 February 2020. And "Flag of Saint Barthélemy" and "Flag of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon"

JasonAQuest removes them all at 04:59, 20 February 2020 because "Flags of TERRITORIES are not national flags. They are territorial flags"


 * 12:43, 20 February 2020. Adds "Flag of the Republic of Abkhazia" in a new "Regional states" section
 * 12:48, 20 February 2020. Adds "Flag of Artsakh" and "Flag of Kosovo" to the above section
 * 12:53, 20 February 2020. And "Flag of the Northern Cyprus", "Flag of South Ossetia" and "Flag of Transnistria"
 * 12:58, 20 February 2020. Adds "Flag of Aland" to a new "Territories" section
 * 13:02, 20 February 2020. Adds "Flag of Faroe Islands" and "Flag of Gibraltar" to the above section
 * 13:06, 20 February 2020. And "Flag of Guernsey", "Flag of the Isle of Man" and "Flag of Jersey"

JasonAQuest removes them all at 22:08, 20 February 2020 with the rather frustrated edit summary of "What language do I have to translate "THESE ARE NOT NATIONAL FLAGS" into for you to understand it?"


 * 07:49, 12 March 2020. Adds "Flag of the Faroe Islands" in a new "Territory in flags of Europe" section
 * 07:53, 12 March 2020. Adds "Flag of Aland" to the above section
 * 08:04, 12 March 2020. And "Flag of Akrotiri and Dhekelia" and "Flag of Gibraltar"

I remove them at 08:06, 12 March 2020 stating "As pointed out several times, they aren't national flags"


 * 08:07, 12 March 2020. Adds "Flag of the Republic of Abkhazia" to a new "Other" section. When the flags are divided into sections of "North America and the Caribbean", "South America", "Europe", "Africa", "Asia" and "Oceania" you have to wonder exactly why we need an "Other" in addition to those....
 * 08:09, 12 March 2020. Adds "Flag of Artsakh" to the above section
 * 08:52, 12 March 2020. And "Flag of Kosovo" and "Flag of Northern Cyprus"
 * 09:03, 12 March 2020. And "Flag of South Ossetia" and "Flag of Transnistria".

I could add edit warring regarding changing Eswatini back to Swaziland (example) and North Macedonia back to Macedonia (example) but I can't be bothered checking through the history again.

They make no attempt to discuss these repeatedly reverted attempts to add non-national flags to this article, they'll just turn up again a few days later and start adding non-national flags again. Asked on their talk page at 10:24, 12 March 2020 to stop edit warring and discuss their changes. FDW777 (talk) 12:04, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Correct National flags of Bolivia, Venezuela, and Costa Rica
I have been wondering if the state or civil flags are the correct national flags of Bolivia, Venezuela and Costa Rica. The Pages for the countries and their flags show the state flags as national flags, but the state ones have an extra caption in their images, and the “Gallery of Sovereign State Flags” page and all other pages they are featured on show the civil ones, as did the “National Flags” page before I changed them to state ones. Other than that, the emoji flags for Costa Rica and Venezuela show the civil one (🇨🇷) (🇻🇪), and the one for Bolivia shows the state one (🇧🇴). Does anyone know the correct national flag? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.192.194.183 (talk) 16:47, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Suggestion to remove section
To end the never-ending problem of people adding non-sovereign state flags to this article, I propose National flag is removed. No information will be lost, since the sovereign state flags are covered at Gallery of sovereign state flags and the flags that shouldn't be added to this article are covered at Gallery of flags of dependent territories. FDW777 (talk) 20:50, 30 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Since two people agreed at above, I have done it. FDW777 (talk) 21:17, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Sections and flags
I have, yet again, reverted an attempt by an IP editor to add random galleries of flags at random places in the article. The text in National flag deals with civil flags, state flags and military flags, which is why there are corresponding flags for each of them. Similarly the text at National flag deals with naval ensigns, which is why there's a corresponding flag. FDW777 (talk) 07:25, 30 May 2021 (UTC)

@ 49.35.255.158 (talk) 15:25, 11 December 2023 (UTC)