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I wonder what's with the black and white and ermine motif here. These elements are usually associated with Brittany, and it's on damned near every flag here. The modern Breton flag, designed to look similar to the US and Greek flags which were considered symbols of democracy in the 1920s when it was designed.  The flag of the province of Brittany after annexation by the French in 1532  Coat of arms of the Dukes of Brittany after the early 1300s  I'm not sure when they decided to create flags for the departments (equivalent to US counties) but they're all pretty terrible except one. Loire Atlantique has the Loire river running through it.  Morbihan is bordered on the south by the Atlantic ocean  Ctes d'Armor has the Channel to its north.  Ille et Vilaine has the Ille and Vilaine rivers running through it  Finisterre has the flags of Kerne and Leon either holding hands or doing a double bro-fist. During the Revolution the state re-organized everything into departments, Kerne and Leon were two ancient Breton counties that were consolidated into one French department.  Flag of Kerne  Flag of Leon  I've always thought the flag of the city of Vannes was cute, a little ermine wearing a cape with ermines on it. 
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Dec 15, 2013 13:39
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Here's the coat of arms for my country   The shield in the center contains the badge of each Australian state (sorry territories): New South Wales - the cross of Saint George with lion and stars. Victoria - the crown and Southern Cross Queensland - blue Maltese cross and crown South Australia - the "piping strike" (splayed black bird) Western Australia - black swan Tasmania - red lion Above the shield is the seven-pointed Commonwealth star. The shield is supported by a Kangaroo and an Emu.  Every Australian schoolchild will tell you it's because they can't walk backwards! They actually can, though, they just don't do it very often  Wikipedia tells me it's probably because they scale the best of our native animals. Considering their competition is a koala, platypus or Tasmanian devil (among others), I've got to admit it makes sense. Surrounding the animals is golden wattle, our national flower for some reason? And down the bottom is a big ol' banner with the name of the country on it, in case you forget  welcome to Australia!
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Dec 17, 2013 12:12
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I can't help but laugh whenever I see this one However, then I learned about the crest of my own province. I don't think I should be saying anything about their lions. At least they have actual lions. We've got one with a fish tail about to club someone to death with a fleur de lis. 
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Dec 17, 2013 13:16
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Remembered another favorite. The city of Surabaya is Indonesia's second largest, but it's not famous for much outside Indonesia (where it's remembered as the City of Heroes, where Indonesian independence began). The traditional myth is that the city was founded on marshland where a giant shark (sura) fought a giant crocodile (baya). The symbol of the city is, therefore, a shark fighting a crocodile (behind the Hero Monument):  This also results in some pretty impressive statuary:  Welcome to the city of  SharkrocodileOne Swell Foop has a new favorite as of 21:37 on Dec 17, 2013 |
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Dec 17, 2013 21:33
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This is the flag I see the most in my city We are not very patriotic. That's the wife of the most prominent pro-pot guy in Canada, by the way. Or at least he was until he was extradited to an American prison.
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Dec 17, 2013 21:48
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I was studying here: but the archives are closed for Christmas, so I went here:  to get a tattoo. Tomorrow I'm going here:  Either Thuringia or Hesse is very unoriginal. Their flags look almost identical too. Hesse:  Thuringia:  The state of Thuringia was formed from seven counties in 1920, so its original flag was gules, seven mullets of six points argent.  But the Nazis changed it to the arms of the Ludowingers, former landgraves of Thuringia whose line died out in 1247.
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Dec 18, 2013 02:24
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The Spanish exclave of Ceuta has a pretty cool flag. In general I just really like black and white flags. The flag of Brittany is my favorite, along with Estonia. I guess I just find black and white very striking.
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Dec 18, 2013 06:28
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Insertnamehere31 posted:The Spanish exclave of Ceuta has a pretty cool flag. Looks like the Portuguese coat of arms. How did come to be?
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Dec 18, 2013 21:21
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SirPhoebos posted:Gentlemen, BEHOLD! This is amazing. Does anyone have a large, High-Res version of this?
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Dec 18, 2013 21:26
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Falukorv posted:Looks like the Portuguese coat of arms. How did come to be? The Portuguese conquered the city during the Reconquista, so I think that's why.
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Dec 19, 2013 00:09
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Rich Uncle Chet posted:This is amazing. Does anyone have a large, High-Res version of this? It's vector graphic at wikipedia so it can be enhanced, here's 2000px: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._Negker.svg.png One Swell Foop posted:The city of Surabaya is Indonesia's second largest, but it's not famous for much outside Indonesia (where it's remembered as the City of Heroes, where Indonesian independence began). The traditional myth is that the city was founded on marshland where a giant shark (sura) fought a giant crocodile (baya).
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Dec 19, 2013 01:25
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origami manatee posted:so who won A future Cracked.com writer.
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Dec 19, 2013 03:00
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DarkCrawler posted:Those are really cool. Some of them don't seem to have that much thought behind them, but some are pretty recognizable in interesting ways...  This is Detroit's official city flag. It's pretty similar to a lot of city flags in the US: a combination of various colonizing powers (France & England) with the stars & stripes and the city's seal.
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Dec 19, 2013 05:48
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Soviet Commubot posted:The flag of the province of Brittany after annexation by the French in 1532 Relevant to the previous discussion of unweildy heraldic blazons, Brittany is at the other end of the spectrum, its blazon being quote:Ermine
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Dec 19, 2013 06:02
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Six pages and no Mexico? Enough with this bourgeois European heraldic crap. Look at that beauty. You won't find that shade of green anywhere. Look at the colors on that cactus. Check out the rad Aztec symbol below the cactus. And if you look closely you'll notice the flag holding the branches together. Yeah, it's a loving flag within a flag. The central symbol was redesigned in 1968 and is still in use today. The original flag of the First Mexican Empire (sorry Guatemala) looked like this:  But I think this is my favorite. Designed in 1934:  I don't know why the eagle is looking left. Perhaps because the leftist President Lazaro Cardenas was in power. And this is the flag of my city:  It's pretty rad because it was the flag of the Republic of the Rio Grande. A short lived rebel nation in Northern Mexico/Southern Tejas. We show off that we're the only place in Texas with seven flags instead of six.  Remember that Texas was first explored by the French, then taken by the Spanish, then Mexico, then the Republic of Texas, then the US, then the Confederacy. Frijolero has a new favorite as of 06:51 on Dec 19, 2013 |
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Dec 19, 2013 06:45
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Frijolero posted:
Now you're just hurting Pensacola, FL.  City of Five Flags! 
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Dec 19, 2013 07:00
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origami manatee posted:so who won They're still fighting.
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Dec 19, 2013 07:20
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origami manatee posted:It's vector graphic at wikipedia so it can be enhanced, here's 2000px: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._Negker.svg.png As far as I know, it's a folk tale and it varies, but I think the story goes that they fought many times then had a truce where the shark took the ocean and the crocodile took the land, but the shark started sneaking into the river so they had one last fight in the river and the crocodile won that one.
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Dec 19, 2013 09:59
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With heraldry, isn't there something with diagonals that changes the meaning? I thought I read somewhere that if it went from upper right to lower left it was a bastardized familial line.
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Dec 19, 2013 10:12
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 Morocco's flag has always looked weirdly for a Muslim country.
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Dec 20, 2013 04:20
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Internet Cliche posted:
Could someone photoshop this so the latin instead reads "Leave the Bronx!"? It would make me so happy 
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Dec 20, 2013 04:54
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Whorelord posted:
The pentagram used to be a sort of good luck symbol going back to the Ancient Greek Pythagoreans who believed that geometric shapes were sacred. In ye olden days the "evil" pentagram was drawn upside down, with two points up, but people don't know that nowadays.
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Dec 20, 2013 08:26
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Specifically, in the flag of Morocco, it's meant to be the seal of King Solomon. According to some myths, Solomon had a magical signet ring that he used to bind and imprison demons and evil djinn - maybe that's where the demonic association came from? The seal of Solomon also appears on the Ethiopian flag - though, oddly, only the modern republic flag, never when the country was ruled by kings who claimed decent from Solomon. The seal's also sometimes depicted as a six-pointed star, like the Star of David. Not sure if there's a connection; if there is, it means there's a Muslim, Christian and Jewish country each with the seal on their flag!
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Dec 20, 2013 09:56
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Angry Salami posted:Specifically, in the flag of Morocco, it's meant to be the seal of King Solomon. According to some myths, Solomon had a magical signet ring that he used to bind and imprison demons and evil djinn - maybe that's where the demonic association came from? The wiki for the Star of David indicates a connection. Wikipedia posted:
That's really neat. I never knew those two symbols had anything in common besides being stars.
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Dec 20, 2013 12:32
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Amateurs,  CoA and flag of lovely Dutch municipality Haaksbergen.
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Dec 20, 2013 12:39
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I'm going to keep the ball rolling with Latin America. Nobody has posted Brazil. I would argue that they have the most unique national flag.  It's also pretty. The globe represents the night sky over Brazil. The motto is "Order and Progress," a nod to the prevailing liberal attitudes in Brazil. This is the Wiphala (emblem) of the Andes people. It is also technically Bolivia's national flag. Though the original one is most used.  Every other South American flag is butt ugly.
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Dec 21, 2013 03:24
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Angry Salami posted:Specifically, in the flag of Morocco, it's meant to be the seal of King Solomon. According to some myths, Solomon had a magical signet ring that he used to bind and imprison demons and evil djinn - maybe that's where the demonic association came from? The royal ethiopian flag had the Lion of Judah on it.
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Dec 21, 2013 03:29
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 St. Louis, my hometown, has a pretty rad flag.
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Dec 21, 2013 05:19
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Frijolero posted:Every other South American flag is butt ugly.   Okay, I will agree that the sun is kinda poo poo.  Most of us Argentinians grew with the completely incorrect idea that the colours of our flag are due to the sky and the clouds. The truth is kinda sad, to be honest. We're using the colours from the Bourbon dynasty, rulers of Spain. Just ask Carlos V.  King Alfonso XII  Or Admiral Gravina. 
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Dec 21, 2013 13:00
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 Uruguay has three official flags, the one above is called Artigas' flag. It was created by the guy we didn't listen to and sent to die alone in Paraguay. The second is the Flag of the 33 Orientals  And the third is just America's flag during day 
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Dec 21, 2013 15:35
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Azran posted:Most of us Argentinians grew with the completely incorrect idea that the colours of our flag are due to the sky and the clouds. In a similar vein, in the case of the Brazil flag, we were always told that the yellow is supposed to represent the gold in the territory, and the green is supposed to represent the forests and poo poo. It actually represents the dynasty of Pedro I, the first Emperor of Brazil. 
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Dec 21, 2013 17:41
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Which might also explain why the Museu do Ipiranga (built to commemorate Pedro's declaration of independence) was painted yellow.
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Dec 26, 2013 15:26
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The village of Whitesboro, NY: This is the newer logo. Originally the white dude's hands were straight-up on the native guy's neck, but they moved them down a little after complaints were filed with the Village Board in 1977. Either way, it's still the village founder choking out an Oneida chief during what the records assure us was a friendly wrestling match. Per the village history website: "When the Indian finally rose, he shrugged his shoulders and was said to have muttered "UGH", you good fellow too much". Hugh White became a hero in the eyes of the Oneida Indians."
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Dec 26, 2013 15:57
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Frijolero posted:
This hi-res image made me realize how ignorant I was to how cool Mexico's flag is, from afar it looks like any old crest with a bird of prey on it but I never noticed the glyph and the cactus on it.
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Dec 26, 2013 19:27
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twoday posted:
It's interesting that the Union Flag is hoisted on the right. I guess it was done for symmetry, but that must be fairly unique amongst flags which incorporate it.
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Dec 29, 2013 21:02
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origami manatee posted:It's vector graphic at wikipedia so it can be enhanced, here's 2000px: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._Negker.svg.png Thanks!
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Dec 29, 2013 22:59
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People thought that the old flags for Sardinia and Corsica were racist:  so they changed them:  
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Dec 29, 2013 23:59
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I don't really understand how they would be racist in a Sardinian/Corsican context, unless there's a sizable black minority present on those islands, or a shameful imperial past I'm unaware of?
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Dec 30, 2013 01:30
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the jizz taxi posted:I don't really understand how they would be racist in a Sardinian/Corsican context, unless there's a sizable black minority present on those islands, or a shameful imperial past I'm unaware of? Sorry. You're right. Looking at it from a local perspective, there is nothing wrong with blackamoor art or Zwarte Piet or lawn jockeys.
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Dec 30, 2013 01:53
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alcyon posted:Amateurs, Ours(Kerkrade) is even dumber however, our flag:  I can't find any data on how old this is, we either ripped off Monaco's or the other way around, either way it makes us look really stupid now that Indonesia exists. our CoA is a guy with a terribly drawn face, also pickaxes(in black) because we used to mine coal, which is at least slightly relevant to what we historically did: 
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Dec 30, 2013 02:23
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