Flag | Origins, Forms, & Functions

Flag, a piece of cloth, bunting, or similar material displaying the insignia of a sovereign state, a community, an organization, 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, and the outer part is called the fly. A flag’s length (also called the fly) usually exceeds its width (hoist). The main portion of the flag, constituting all or most of its area, is called the field or ground.

In addition, flags often have a design element in the upper corner of the hoist, called the canton, which is distinct from the field.

Flags of various forms and purpose are known as colours, standards, banners, ensigns, pendants (or pennants), pennons, guidons, and burgees.

Flag of Vatican City, an exception to the European heraldic rule about not combining two “metal” colours (i.e., yellow and white) in a flag design.

Flags originally were used mainly in warfare, and to some extent they have remained 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 that rule.