History Of The Flags Of Romania
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The national flag of Romania has three colors arranged vertically in blue, yellow, red order beginning from the flagstaff. These colors were present on the 16th century imperial awards, banners and shields of Michael the Brave. In the times of the Walachian revolution of 1821, these colors were used on the activists’ flag and its borders and were ascribed a meaning: blue for liberty, yellow for justice, and red for fraternity.
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The tricolor with blue-yellow-red order was accepted for the first time in 1834 in Walachia. Before that the flag had red-blue-yellow order with stars and a bird’s head in the center.
Thus, the flag approved for Walachia in 1848 was a blue, yellow, and red tricolor. But what would be the design of the national flag was not yet very clear. So, in July 1848, it was decided that the flag would have three vertical bands: dark blue color close to the flagpole, followed by light yellow and then carmine red color. According to some historians, the flag’s design was inspired by the French flag. But others think that it symbolized Romania’s old tradition and was not a replica of the French flag. These colors had been used by Romania’s ancestors on their flags and shields, etc.
In 1859 to 1866, the national flag’s vertical design was changed by the United Principalities of Walachia and Moldavia to horizontal bands: red on the top, yellow in the center, and blue below.
The new design was recognized worldwide. After sometime, in the session of March 1867, the Assembly of Deputies came to a decision that the order and position of colors would be vertical, just like that in the year 1848. Only the army, navy and royal flags would have the nation’s coat of arms in the middle. Civilian and commercial ships’ flags would not use a coat of arms. There was no change in this design until 1948, except some change in the pattern of the coat of arms.
Romania was declared a democratic nation on December 30, 1947. All the signs of old kingdom together with the tricolor flag and the coat of arms were banned. The coat of arms was changed many times till 1989.
In the revolution at Timisoara, in 1989, the Romanian Social Republic’s coat of arms was torn off the flags and was seen as a sign of Ceausescu’s autocratic rule. These became popular as the flags with the hole. Finally, the tricolor of Romania remained as it was in the year 1848.
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