The flag of Sark is white with a red St. George's cross and a red canton containing the two yellow lions (or in heraldic terms "

Leopard The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant species in the genus '' Panthera'', a member of the cat family, Felidae. It occurs in a wide range in sub-Saharan Africa, in some parts of Western and Central Asia, Southern Russia, a ...

s") from the

flag of Normandy The flag and coat of arms of Normandy are symbols of Normandy, a region in north-western France. Normandy The traditional provincial flag, ''gules, two lions passant or'', is used in both former regions of France: Lower Normandy and Upper Norman ...

. Unlike the classic

White Ensign The White Ensign, at one time called the St George's Ensign due to the simultaneous existence of a cross-less version of the flag, is an ensign worn on British Royal Navy ships and shore establishments. It consists of a red St George's Cross on ...

s, the lions of the flag of Sark protrude outside the canton and overflow the red cross. It was designed by

Herbert Pitt Herbert may refer to: People Individuals * Herbert (musician), a pseudonym of Matthew Herbert Name * Herbert (given name) * Herbert (surname) Places Antarctica * Herbert Mountains, Coats Land * Herbert Sound, Graham Land Australia * Herbert, ...

in 1938 and adopted the same year as the personal standard of the

Seigneur of Sark The Seigneur of Sark is the head of Sark in the Channel Islands. "Seigneur" is the French word for "lord", and a female head of Sark is called Dame of Sark, of which there have been three. The husband of a female ruler of Sark is not a consort b ...

before becoming the island's flag in 1987. The canton is similar to the arms of

Normandy Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...

, of which the Channel Islands are historically a part. The flag is flown from the

Ministry of Justice A Ministry of Justice is a common type of government department that serves as a justice ministry. Lists of current ministries of justice Named "Ministry" * Ministry of Justice (Abkhazia) * Ministry of Justice (Afghanistan) * Ministry of Just ...

in London on 6 August to mark the granting of the fief on that day in 1565. The Ministry of Justice is the British government department responsible for relations with the Crown Dependencies.

History

Sark Sark (french: link=no, Sercq, ; Sercquiais: or ) is a part of the Channel Islands in the southwestern English Channel, off the coast of Normandy, France. It is a royal fief, which forms part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, with its own set of l ...

is a Channel Island part of the

Bailiwick A bailiwick () is usually the area of jurisdiction of a bailiff, and once also applied to territories in which a privately appointed bailiff exercised the sheriff's functions under a royal or imperial writ. The bailiwick is probably modelled on th ...

Guernsey Guernsey (; Guernésiais: ''Guernési''; french: Guernesey) is an island in the English Channel off the coast of Normandy that is part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, a British Crown Dependency. It is the second largest of the Channel Islands ...

. It was originally part of the

Duchy of Normandy The Duchy of Normandy grew out of the 911 Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte between King Charles III of West Francia and the Viking leader Rollo. The duchy was named for its inhabitants, the Normans. From 1066 until 1204, as a result of the Norman c ...

and was owned by the

monarchs of England This list of kings and reigning queens of the Kingdom of England begins with Alfred the Great, who initially ruled Wessex, one of the seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which later made up modern England. Alfred styled himself King of the Anglo-Sax ...

from 1066 when Duke William of Normandy successfully invaded England and assumed the English throne. By the late Middle Ages, Sark had become a hotbed for piracy and other criminal activities. On 6 August 1565,

Queen Elizabeth I Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". El ...

appointed

Hellier de Carteret Hellier de Carteret (fl. 1563 – 1578) was the first Seigneur of Sark, reigning from 1563 to 1578. He was the son of Édouard de Carteret, Seigneur of Saint Ouen (d. 1533), and grandson of Philip de Carteret, 8th Seigneur of St Ouen. It was H ...

as the

(known as the Dame of Sark when the holder is female) to prevent it becoming a pirate island. The office would be hereditary and the holder had to pay the English (and later British) monarch £1.79 annually for the right to rule the island as a feudal fief. As of 9 December 2008, the day before democracy was introduced to Sark, the island was the last feudal state in the Western world. The flag of Sark was designed in 1938 when the Dame of Sark, Dame Sibyl Hathaway, approached Herbert Pitt to design a personal standard for herself. The flag was also referred to as the Seigneur's flag. The story that Dame Sibyl had told the

Flag Institute The Flag Institute is a UK membership organisation headquartered in Kingston upon Hull, England, concerned with researching and promoting the use and design of flags. It documents flags in the UK and internationally, maintains a UK Flag Registr ...

that the flag had been in use for "at least two hundred years", is doubted. The flag remained as the Seigneur's flag following the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

and the

German occupation of the Channel Islands The military occupation of the Channel Islands by Nazi Germany lasted for most of the Second World War, from 30 June 1940 until liberation on 9 May 1945. The Bailiwick of Jersey and Bailiwick of Guernsey are two island countries and British ...

. In the 1960s, Dame Sibyl sold the

tenement A tenement is a type of building shared by multiple dwellings, typically with flats or apartments on each floor and with shared entrance stairway access. They are common on the British Isles, particularly in Scotland. In the medieval Old Town, i ...

of the island of

Brecqhou Brecqhou (or Brechou; ) is one of the Channel Islands, located off the west coast of Sark where they are now geographically detached from each other. Brecqhou is politically part of both Sark and the Bailiwick of Guernsey. It has been establishe ...

to Leonard Matchan. Upon taking up the tenancy, he adopted his own flag for Brecqhou using the Seigneur's flag as the basis and sewed his own personal coat of arms onto it. In 1993, when the tenement was purchased by

David and Frederick Barclay Sir David Rowat Barclay (27 October 1934 – 10 January 2021) and Sir Frederick Hugh Barclay (born 27 October 1934), commonly referred to as the "Barclay Brothers" or "Barclay Twins", were British billionaires. They were identical twin brothers ...

, they also adopted their own flag by using the Seigneur's flag with their coat of arms defacing it. In 1987, when Sark was invited to participate in the inaugural

Island Games The Island Games (currently known as the NatWest International Island Games for sponsorship reasons) are biennial international multi-sports events organised by the International Island Games Association (IIGA). Competitor teams each represent d ...

, it was noted the island had no individual flag to represent it. Accordingly, the Seigneur

John Michael Beaumont Seigneur John Michael Beaumont (20 December 1927 – 3 July 2016) was the twenty-second Seigneur of Sark in the Channel Islands. He worked as a civil engineer before succeeding his paternal grandmother, Sibyl Hathaway, the 21st Dame of Sa ...

granted permission for the Seigneur's flag to be used as the flag of Sark.

References

{{Flags of British dependencies National symbols of Sark

Flags displaying animals de:Flagge Guernseys#Flaggen der Inseln

History

See also

References