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Text and/or other creative content from this version of Union Jack was copied or moved into National flag with this edit. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists. |
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
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)
Cornwall is not a nation, it is only a county. Superdantaylor 23:59, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
oldest national flag in use today?
what about scottish flag? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.129.168.202 ( talk) 09:12, August 25, 2007 (UTC)
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 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)).
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)
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)
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)
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)
I've just removed the following passage from the article:
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
Documenting here for ease of reference for page protection requests if the disruption continues, I'm only documenting from after this removal by @ JasonAQuest: at 03:43, 14 February 2020 which correctly removed "dependent territories and "other areas" because they aren't NATIONS".
JasonAQuest removes them all at 04:59, 20 February 2020 because "Flags of TERRITORIES are not national flags. They are territorial flags"
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?"
I remove them at 08:06, 12 March 2020 stating "As pointed out several times, they aren't national flags"
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)
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)
To end the never-ending problem of people adding non-sovereign state flags to this article, I propose National flag#Current flags 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)
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#On land 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#At sea 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)
This
level-4 vital article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||
|
Text and/or other creative content from this version of Union Jack was copied or moved into National flag with this edit. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists. |
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
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)
Cornwall is not a nation, it is only a county. Superdantaylor 23:59, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
oldest national flag in use today?
what about scottish flag? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.129.168.202 ( talk) 09:12, August 25, 2007 (UTC)
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 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)).
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)
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)
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)
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)
I've just removed the following passage from the article:
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
Documenting here for ease of reference for page protection requests if the disruption continues, I'm only documenting from after this removal by @ JasonAQuest: at 03:43, 14 February 2020 which correctly removed "dependent territories and "other areas" because they aren't NATIONS".
JasonAQuest removes them all at 04:59, 20 February 2020 because "Flags of TERRITORIES are not national flags. They are territorial flags"
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?"
I remove them at 08:06, 12 March 2020 stating "As pointed out several times, they aren't national flags"
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)
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)
To end the never-ending problem of people adding non-sovereign state flags to this article, I propose National flag#Current flags 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)
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#On land 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#At sea 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)