Weeping Vexillologists III: Flags By Colour Quiz

Answer: Russia

The national flags of China, Turkey, Morocco and Vietnam all have flags that are more than 90% red. This is because they have an entire red field with only small embellishments: Vietnam and Morocco have a single star (Morocco's is strictly a pentacle); China has one small star and four smaller ones; Turkey has a crescent and a moon.

The old USSR had a similar flag: an entire red field with a small yellow star, hammer and sickle in the canton (pictured). However, upon the breakup of the USSR, Russia adopted a white blue and red horizontal tri-band. While this is a very popular combination (tri-band and a red/white/blue combination, this flag is unusual in this configuration as the white band is at the top not the middle.

Author's Note: When referring to colours of a flag, most vexillologists refer to the colours of the flag itself minus any colours of the Coat of Arms if they are included on the flag. However this is not standardised. Accordingly, question choice on flags which do contain a coat of arms have been crafted to eliminate any ambiguity. Thanks.

Answer: Bangladesh

Haiti has a blue horizontal band over a red ban with a coat of arms in the middle, as does Lichtenstein but with a black and gold crown in the canton area. Belize has two narrow red horizontal bands over an otherwise blue field with the coat of arms, centrally located.

Bangladesh has a red circle depicting the sun slightly off centre to the left over a green field.

The depicted flag is that of East Pakistan (1955-1971) which was the former name of the country. However it seceded from (West) Pakistan in 1971.

Answer: Singapore

Ignoring ratios, the flags of Indonesia and Monaco are identical: a red band over a white band. In Poland the colours are reversed.

The flag of Singapore is similar to that of Indonesia and Poland, with an additional crescent moon and five small stars. The Chinese population of Singapore wanted five stars to reflect the flag of China; the Muslim population wanted a crescent moon. Both were accommodated in the final flag, though the origins of these elements are not mentioned on the final design.

According to the Singaporean Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts, the design reflects "a young nation on the ascendant, universal brotherhood and equality, and national ideals", without specification attached to individual elements.

The depicted flag is the national flag of Malaysia. In the 1960s Malaya and Singapore formed a single country called Malaysia from which Singapore soon seceded.

Answer: Uruguay

Finland has a blue Scandinavian (off-centre) cross on a white back ground. Greece has a blue cross in the canton over alternating blue and white stripes. Israel has two blue bands on the upper and lower edges with a wider white band in the middle with a centred blue Star of David.

Uruguay has a field of five white stripes alternating with four blue stripes. In the canton (white field) there is a yellow sun figure. Argentina has a similar colour arrangement with a central sun and three blue and white bands.

The depicted flag is Kazakhstan which, among several gold elements features a depiction of the sun, a feature that distinguished the Uruguayan flag from the other three blue and white flags.

Answer: Luxembourg

The Pan-Slavic colours are red, white and blue and hence most of the flags of the region reflect this with most countries adopting a red white and blue tri-band (Czech Republic has a different pattern), though the band order changes across the countries with these flags. Croatia, Slovakia and Slovenia all make their flags unique with the addition of their respective coat of arms but even then, the positions is different with placement being centre off to the left and in the canton respectively.

Luxembourg has a plain tri-band of red, white blue (top to bottom). It is almost identical to the Netherlands flag except the blue on the Luxembourg flag is much lighter. The colours reflect the coat of arms of the Grand Duke which date back to the 13th century.

The photo depicts Belgium's flag. Following the Belgian Revolution, the French-speaking part of Luxembourg was ceded to Belgium in 1839.

Answer: Green, Gold, and Black

While Jamaica has none of the three most popular colors in its flag, it has the three next most popular: gold, green and black. It has a gold saltire (diagonal cross) with alternating triangular fields of green and black.

Until 2017 the flag of Mauritania also did not have any red, white or blue. Indeed it only had green and gold. According to its government's Information Department the red bands (pictured) were added for "the efforts and sacrifices that the people of Mauritania will keep consenting, to the price of their blood, to defend their territory".

Answer: Mauritus

The Mauritius flag was adopted in 1968 but the country did not achieve its status as a republic until 1992. Many sources quoted the bands to mean the following: Red (top band) reflects the struggle for freedom and independence, blue the colour of the ocean, yellow a new light of independence and green the vegetation of the island. The symbolism was invented after independence, and was considered with skepticism until there was official ratification by the Mauritius government in 2015 who adjusted the meanings of each band slightly. Nevertheless it is the world's only four band flag though the flag of the Central African Republic is close, but also unique with a red stripe displacing its four horizontal bands.

The picture depicts the flag of Madagascar, a neighboring African island to Mauritius.

Answer: Five oblique bands radiating like sunbeams from the bottom left of the flag

The Seychelles flag is interesting because its colours were chosen to reflect the political position. The romanticism of the symbolism came later. After independence from France by coup in 1976, a saltire flag was chosen with the colours the same as those of the ruling party, the SPUP. In 1993 after the new constitution ratified the existence of other political parties, the colours of the democratic Party were included, hence the five colours. The design to have the five colours radiate from the bottom left of the flag mimics the shining sun but the official reason was that it "represented a dynamic young country moving into a new future". The official government symbolism was ratified as "The colour blue depicts the sky and the sea that surrounds the Seychelles. Yellow is for the sun which gives light and life, red symbolises the people and their determination to work for the future in unity and love, whilst the white band represents social justice and harmony. The green depicts the land and natural environment".

The picture depicts the flag of Rwanda, which is an African country close to the Seychelles. Its flag has similar colouring and symbolism to the Seychelles flag, and the sun being represented on both flags is probably due to the two countries' proximity to the equator.

Answer: South Sudan

South Sudan formed a new country in 2011 when it broke away from Sudan. Its flag however is based on the Sudanese flag (pictured) which is based on the pan-Arab colours of Red, black, green and white.

The South Sudan flag re-arranged the three bands to be from top to bottom black, red, green. Two very thin white bands separate these three bands. The triangle features a blue triangle (which symbolises a future with optimism). (These five colours are the five colours that are shared with the flags of Zimbabwe, Guyana and St Kitts and Nevis) However the South Sudan triangle is blue not green.

Answer: South Africa

It seems appropriate that the country that changed from an apartheid regime to the embracing of multiculturalism so vividly and adopted 11 official languages should be the first flag to feature six colours. The new flag dates back to 1996 and it is defined in its Constitution ((Schedule 1 National Flag) as:-

"Here is the flag as defined in the 1996 (most recent, permanent) Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (Schedule 1: National Flag)
(Note that the colours are different both to those reported by Will Linden and the heraldic tinctures, and that it is in legal rather than heraldic language).

(1) The national flag is rectangular; it is one and a half times longer than it is wide.
(2) It is black, gold, green, white, chilli red and blue
(3) It has a green Y-shaped band that is one fifth as wide as the flag. The centre lines of the band start in the top and bottom corners next to the flag post, converge in the centre of the flag, and continue horizontally to the middle of the free edge.
(4) The green band is edged, above and below in white, and towards the flag post end, in gold. Each edging is one fifteenth as wide as the flag.
(5) The triangle next to the flag post is black.
(6) The upper horizontal band is chilli red and the lower horizontal band is blue. These bands are each one third as wide as the flag.
Quite possibly the most complicated national flag in the world. Like its predecessor (pictured featuring its colonial past masters), the new flag represents a compromise.

The colours themselves have no official symbolism, they do reflect the South African history: Black, green and gold, feature in the flags of the liberation movements, such as the African National Congress and the Pan-Africanist Congress. Blue, white and red point towards the British and Dutch colonialism. The green component is interpreted as the unification of many ethnic groups. This latter interpretation has no official ratification.