flag

flag¹

—flagger, n. —flagless, adj.

/flag/, n., v., flagged, flagging.

n.

1. a piece of cloth, varying in size, shape, color, and design, usually attached at one edge to a staff or cord, and used as the symbol of a nation, state, or organization, as a means of signaling, etc.; ensign; standard; banner; pennant.

2. Ornith. the tuft of long feathers on the legs of falcons and most hawks; the lengthened feathers on the crus or tibia.

3. Hunting. the tail of a deer or of a setter dog.

4. Journalism.

a. the nameplate of a newspaper.

b. masthead (def. 1).

c. the name of a newspaper as printed on the editorial page.

5. a tab or tag attached to a page, file card, etc., to mark it for attention.

6. Music. hook (def. 12a).

7. Motion Pictures, Television. a small gobo.

8. Usually, flags. the ends of the bristles of a brush, esp. a paintbrush, when split.

9. Computers. a symbol, value, or other means of identifying data of interest, or of informing later parts of a program what conditions earlier parts have encountered.

10. strike the flag,

a. to relinquish command, as of a ship.

b. to submit or surrender: His financial situation is growing worse, but he's not ready to strike the flag. Also, strike one's flag.

v.t.

11. to place a flag or flags over or on; decorate with flags.

12. to signal or warn (a person, automobile, etc.) with or as if with a flag (sometimes fol. by down): to flag a taxi; to flag down a passing car.

13. to communicate (information) by or as if by a flag.

14. to decoy, as game, by waving a flag or the like to excite attention or curiosity.

15. to mark (a page in a book, file card, etc.) for attention, as by attaching protruding tabs.

16. (of a brush) to split the ends of the bristles.

[1475-85; perh. b. FLAP (n.) and FAG¹ (n.) in obs. sense "flap"]

flag²

/flag/, n.

1. any of various plants with long, sword-shaped leaves, as the sweet flag.

2. See blue flag.

3. the long, slender leaf of such a plant or of a cereal.

[1350-1400; ME flagge]

flag³

/flag/, v.i., flagged, flagging.

1. to fall off in vigor, energy, activity, interest, etc.: Public enthusiasm flagged when the team kept losing.

2. to hang loosely or limply; droop.

[1535-45; perh. b. of FLAP (v.) and FAG¹ (v.) in obs. sense "to droop". See FLAG¹]

Syn. 1. dwindle, wilt, slump, sag, wane.

flag⁴

—flagger, n.

/flag/, n., v., flagged, flagging.

n.

1. flagstone (def. 1).

2. flags, flagstone (def. 2).

v.t.

3. to pave with flagstones.

[1400-50; late ME flagge piece of sod; akin to ON flaga slab]

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Combination of symbols represented on a piece of cloth, serving as a medium of social, typically political, communication.

It is usually rectangular and attached by one edge to a staff or is hoisted on a pole with halyards. Flags appear to be as old as civilized human society, though their origin is not well understood. The Chinese may have been the first to develop cloth flags, and it is believed that they were introduced to Europe by returning Crusaders. Most national flags in use today were designed in the 19th and 20th centuries.

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▪ heraldry

Introduction

      a piece of cloth, bunting, or similar material displaying the insignia of a community, an armed force, an office, or an individual. A flag is usually, but not always, oblong and is attached by one edge to a staff or halyard. The part nearest the staff is called the hoist; the outer part is called the fly. A flag's length (also called the fly) usually exceeds its width (hoist). Flags of various forms and purpose are known as colours, standards, banners, ensigns, pendants (or pennants), pennons, guidons, and burgees.

      Originally used mainly in warfare, flags were, and to some extent remain, insignia of leadership, serving for the identification of friend or foe and as rallying points. They are now also extensively employed for signaling, for decoration, and for display. Because the usefulness of a flag for purposes of identification depends on its blowing out freely in the wind, the material that is preferred is usually light and bears a device or pattern identical on both sides. Wording therefore tends to be excluded, and the simpler patterns are favoured. Any colours or devices may be used, but European usage normally follows the practice of heraldry in discouraging the juxtaposition of “metal” and “metal” (i.e., of yellow and white) or of colour and colour without “metal” interposed. The flag of the Vatican City state constitutes an exception to this rule.

Origins.

      Flags recognizable as such were the invention, almost certainly, of the ancient Indians or the Chinese. It is said that the founder of the Chou dynasty in China (c. 1122 BC) had a white flag carried before him, and it is known that in AD 660 a minor prince was punished for failing to lower his standard before his superior. Chinese flags had devices such as a red bird, a white tiger, or a blue dragon. They were carried on chariots and planted upon the walls of captured cities. The royal flag had, however, all the attributes of kingship, being identified with the ruler himself and treated with a similar respect. It was thus a crime even to touch the flag-bearer. The fall of the flag meant defeat; and the king would rarely expose his flag and his person together, the flag being normally entrusted to a general.

      Flags had equal importance in ancient India, being carried on chariots and elephants. The flag was the first object of attack in battle, and its fall would mean confusion if not defeat. Indian flags were often triangular in shape and scarlet or green in colour, with a figure embroidered in gold and a gold fringe. If these and the Chinese flags had a common origin in the standards of ancient Egypt and Assyria (standards, in this sense, meaning solid objects, such as metal animals, attached atop poles), then they might have developed from the streamers often attached to the pole. This possibility gains some likelihood from the fact that some Indian flagstaffs were surmounted by a figure similar to that displayed on the flag itself. Mughal royal insignia included, however, other things besides the flag, more especially yaks' tails and the state umbrella. Flags seem also to have been used, in India as in China, for signaling, and there is an instance of a white flag being used as a signal for a truce as early as AD 1542. Indian and Chinese usage spread to Burma, Siam, and southeastern Asia. Flags with a background of white, yellow, or black silk are mentioned, with devices (an elephant, a bull, or a water hen, for example) embroidered on them in gold. A Siamese treatise on war gives the impression that the flags were unfurled as the march began.

      Flags were probably transmitted to Europe by the Saracens. But Islām's (Islām) prohibition of the use of any identifiable image as idolatrous influenced their design. They are often mentioned in the early history of Islām and may have been copied from India. But Islāmic flags are greatly simplified and appear to have been plain black or white or red. Black was supposed to have been the colour of Muḥammad's banner—the colour of vengeance. A black flag was used by the ʿAbbāsids in AD 746 (AH 129), the Umayyads choosing white by contrast and the Khawārij red. Green was the colour of the Fāṭimid dynasty and eventually became the colour of Islām. In adopting the crescent sign, however, about 1250, the Ottoman Turks apparently were reverting to an Assyrian sacred symbol of the 9th century BC and probably of greater antiquity than that. The crescent moon, with or without an additional star or stars, has since become the accepted official symbol of Islām.

      In Europe the first “national” flags were adopted in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Many of the leaders of that time adopted the flag of their patron saint to represent their country. In England, for example, the cross of St. George was adopted in the 13th century. Toward the end of the Middle Ages, flags had become accepted symbols of nations, kings, organizations, cities, and guilds. Guild flags bore obvious devices. For instance, a black flag with three white candles represented the candlemakers of Bayeux, Fr.

Forms and functions.

      In Europe, flags were subdivided according to their shape and purpose into standards, banners, guidons, pennons, and streamers. There were also many flags of a personal, family, or local significance that were of a different, and usually more complex, pattern. Of the main types, the standard was the largest and was intended, from its size, to be stationary. It marked the position of an important individual before a battle, during a siege, throughout a ceremony, or at a tournament. For the monarch it marked the palace, castle, saluting base, tent, or ship where he was actually present. Standards were also used at first by the greater nobles, whose personal insignia they bore. They were originally long and tapering toward the fly, ending in two points. Banners were square or oblong and were borne in action (as the standard was not) before royal and noble warriors down to the rank of knight banneret. These again bore the personal or family device. The guidon (a word derived from the French guyd-homme) was similar to the standard but was rounded in the fly or had two swallow tails, both rounded. Guidons were borne by leaders in battle who were of no more than knightly rank and so not entitled to display a banner. The pennon, a small triangular flag, was carried by each knight on his lance. One purpose of the pennon was to obviate accidents in much the same way as does a red flag tied to a long pole or rod that extends beyond the tailboard of a truck. But the pennon served also to strike terror into the enemy and to denote rank. The streamer (now known as a pendant, or pennant) was a long, tapering flag from 60 to 18 feet (18 to 5.5 m) long and about 24 feet (7 m) broad at the hoist, ending in two points. Because of its great length, almost its only use was at sea. In the 15th century it was flown from a pole rising above the fighting top, and later from the yardarm or topmast. It came eventually to distinguish the warship from the merchantman and, more specifically, the warship in commission from the warship laid up in harbour. The pennant is white in the British Royal Navy, with a St. George's cross near the hoist, and denotes a warship in commission, being hoisted when the captain assumes his command.

      The flag, over the centuries, has developed many special uses. The black flag in days gone by was the symbol of the pirate. All over the world a yellow flag is the signal of infectious illness. A ship hoists it to denote that there are some on board suffering from yellow fever, cholera, or some such infectious malady; and it remains hoisted until the ship has passed quarantine. This flag is also hoisted on quarantine stations. The white flag is universally used as a flag of truce.

      At sea, striking, or lowering, the flag denotes surrender. When the flag of one country is placed above that of another, the victory of the former is denoted; hence, in time of peace it would be an insult to hoist the flag of one friendly nation above that of another. Each national flag must be flown from its own flagstaff. To denote honour and respect, a flag is “dipped.” Ships at sea salute each other by “dipping,” i.e., by running the flag slowly down from the masthead and then smartly replacing it. When troops parade before a sovereign or other reviewing officer, the regimental flags are lowered as they salute him. A flag flying at halfmast is the universal symbol of mourning. A ship's signal of distress is made by hoisting the national ensign reversed, i.e., upside down.

National flags.

      The colours and designs of national flags are usually not arbitrarily selected but rather stem from the history, culture, or religion of the particular country. Many flags can be traced to a common origin, and such “flag families” are often linked both by common traditions and by geography. The oldest European flags still in use are those that display the Christian cross, which was first extensively used in the Crusades. In addition to the British flag, the Union Jack (United Kingdom, flag of the) (q.v.), flags with crosses are used by Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Greece, and Switzerland. Following the introduction of heraldry into Europe in the 12th and 13th centuries, European royalty adopted coats of arms that soon became the basis of their flags. These heraldic devices have largely disappeared from modern national flags, but the colours used in the coats of arms are still the colours of the flags of Poland, Belgium, Germany, Spain, Hungary, Luxembourg, and Monaco. The flags of Austria and the tiny states of San Marino and Liechtenstein still display the heraldic devices themselves.

      Among the better known of Europe's striped flags was the red-white-blue flag of the Netherlands. Because of its use in that country's long war for independence from Spain, the flag and its colours became associated with the concepts of liberty and a republican form of government. This association was greatly reinforced by France's adoption of the same colours, but with vertical instead of horizontal stripes, following the French Revolution of 1789. The newly independent United States' choice of these colours for the Stars and Stripes (United States of America, flag of the) (q.v.), however, was based on its former affiliation with Britain and the colours of the Union Jack. Other nations in Europe and in South and Central America selected tricolours of their own to express their adherence to the principles of liberty, equality, and fraternity as embodied in the French flag. The flag of the former Soviet Union was red with a yellow hammer and sickle, the traditional symbol of revolution for communists. China also adopted a red flag on the basis of that colour's communist associations.

      In the Middle East the predominance of Islām has generally limited the choice of flag colours to the four traditional Muslim colours of red, white, green, and black. The flags of most Arab states use one or several of these colours in a tricolour format, although the star and crescent motif is present in the flags of Turkey, Algeria, and Tunisia. Other primarily Muslim countries, such as Pakistan and Malaysia, also use the star and crescent as a sign of their Islāmic faith. Almost all the flags of the sub-Saharan African nations were created in the late 1950s and '60s and bear strong family resemblances to one another. The two major categories are flags of member states of the British Commonwealth and those of nations formerly under French colonial control. The flags of the former French colonies tend to have vertical tricolours and are generally green-yellow-red, while the flags of the Commonwealth members have horizontal tricolours and often include green, blue, black, and white.

      The flags of the countries of Asia present a remarkable diversity that is due largely to the development of distinctive national symbols before the era of European colonization. The one general pattern that may be noted is the use of a religious or political symbol against a background of a solid colour. There are flags featuring the Sun (Japan, Nepal, Taiwan), a wheel (India), the yin-yang symbol (South Korea, Mongolia), a dragon (Bhutan), and a sword (Sri Lanka). Australia and New Zealand use modified versions of a type of British flag, the blue ensign.

      In the Western Hemisphere, Canada uses a maple leaf as a distinctive emblem of the nation. The former political union of five of the countries of Central America is commemorated by their retention of the old blue-white-blue Central American flag, which has been modified by each particular country. The common historical heritage of Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador is shown by the almost identical yellow-blue-red tricolour flags they use. Some other South American countries were influenced in their choice of flags by those of the United States or France.

      Since World War II interest in flags has expanded beyond their creation and use. Political scientists, historians, sociologists, and others recognize them as artifacts expressive of the cultures of certain times and places. The scholarly study of the history, symbolism, etiquette, design, manufacture, and other aspects of flags is known as vexillology (from the Latin vexillum, “banner”). Such studies are fostered by many publications as well as by the International Federation of Vexillological Associations and its members.

      The flags of the countries of the world can be seen in the articles on those countries.

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