A tricolour () or tricolor () is a type of

flag A flag is a piece of fabric (most often rectangular or quadrilateral) with a distinctive design and colours. It is used as a symbol, a signalling device, or for decoration. The term ''flag'' is also used to refer to the graphic design emp ...

or banner design with a triband design which originated in the 16th century as a symbol of

republicanism Republicanism is a political ideology centered on citizenship in a state organized as a republic. Historically, it emphasises the idea of self-rule and ranges from the rule of a representative minority or oligarchy to popular sovereignty. It ...

liberty Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom. In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society fr ...

, or

revolution In political science, a revolution (Latin: ''revolutio'', "a turn around") is a fundamental and relatively sudden change in political power and political organization which occurs when the population revolts against the government, typically due ...

. The

flags of France The national flag of France (french: link=no, drapeau français) is a tricolour featuring three vertical bands coloured blue ( hoist side), white, and red. It is known to English speakers as the ''Tricolour'' (), although the flag of Ireland ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, a ...

Mexico Mexico ( Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guate ...

, and

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

were all first adopted with the formation of an independent republic in the period of the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are conside ...

to the

Revolutions of 1848 The Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Springtime of the Peoples or the Springtime of Nations, were a series of political upheavals throughout Europe starting in 1848. It remains the most widespread revolutionary wave in Euro ...

, with the exception of the Irish tricolour, which dates from 1848 but was not popularised until the Easter Rising in 1916 and adopted in 1919.

History

The first association of the tricolour with republicanism is the orange-white-blue design of the Prince's Flag (''Prinsenvlag'', predecessor of the flags of the Netherlands), used from 1579 by William I of Orange-Nassau in the

Eighty Years' War The Eighty Years' War or Dutch Revolt ( nl, Nederlandse Opstand) ( c.1566/1568–1648) was an armed conflict in the Habsburg Netherlands between disparate groups of rebels and the Spanish government. The causes of the war included the Re ...

, establishing the independence of the

Dutch Republic The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands ( Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiography ...

from the

Spanish Empire The Spanish Empire ( es, link=no, Imperio español), also known as the Hispanic Monarchy ( es, link=no, Monarquía Hispánica) or the Catholic Monarchy ( es, link=no, Monarquía Católica) was a colonial empire governed by Spain and its prede ...

. The flag of the Netherlands inspired both the French and Russian flags, which in turn inspired many further tricolour flags in other countries. Though not the first tricolour flag, one of the most famous, known as ''Le Tricolore'', is the blue, white and red (whence also called ''Le Bleu-Blanc-Rouge'') flag of France adopted in 1790 during the

. Based on a 1789 design of the Cockade of France, it was easy to construct and also stood in a visual opposition to complicated royal banners of the ''Ancien Regime''. With the formation of French client republics after 1795, the revolutionary tricolour was exported and adopted more widely in Europe, by the Republic of Alba 1796 (red-blue-yellow), the

Cisalpine Republic The Cisalpine Republic ( it, Repubblica Cisalpina) was a sister republic of France in Northern Italy that existed from 1797 to 1799, with a second version until 1802. Creation After the Battle of Lodi in May 1796, Napoleon Bonaparte organized ...

1797 ( Transpadane Republic, green-white-red), the Cisrhenian Republic 1797 (green-white-red), the Anconine Republic 1797 (blue-yellow-red), the

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kingd ...

1798 (black-white-red), the Helvetic Republic 1798 (green-red-yellow; canton of Neuchatel 1848), the Parthenopean Republic 1799 (blue-yellow-red), and the Principality of Lucca and Piombino 1805 (blue-white-red). Thus providing the format for many of modern Europe's national flags, from the flag of Italy, to the

flag of Germany The national flag of Germany is a tricolour (flag), tricolour consisting of three equal horizontal bands displaying the national colours of Germany: Sable (heraldry), black, Gules, red, and Or (heraldry), gold (german: :de:Schwarz-Rot-Gold, Sc ...

flag of Ireland The national flag of Ireland ( ga, bratach na hÉireann), frequently referred to in Ireland as 'the tricolour' () and elsewhere as the Irish tricolour is a vertical tricolour of green (at the hoist), white and orange. The proportions of th ...

flag of Belgium The national flag of Belgium ( nl, vlag van België, french: drapeau de la Belgique, german: Flagge Belgiens) is a tricolour consisting of three equal vertical bands displaying the national colours of Belgium: black, yellow, and red. The colo ...

flag of Romania The national flag of Romania ( ro, drapelul României) is a tricolour. The Constitution of Romania states that "The flag of Romania is tricolour; the colours are arranged vertically in the following order from the flagpole: blue, yellow, red" ...

, flag of Bulgaria, flag of Moldova, and others around the world such as the

flag of India The national flag of India, colloquially called the tricolour, is a horizontal rectangular tricolour flag of India saffron, white and India green; with the ', a 24-spoke wheel, in navy blue at its centre. It was adopted in its present form d ...

, flag of Cameroon,

flag of Chad The national flag of Chad (french: Drapeau du Tchad; ar, علم تشاد) is a vertical tricolour consisting (left to right) of a blue, a gold and a red field. Since the 1990s, its similarity to the flag of Romania has caused international ...

flag of Ivory Coast The national flag of Ivory Coast (french: drapeau de la Côte d'Ivoire) is a tricolor flag consisting of equal bands of orange (hoist side), white, and green. The proportions of the flag are 2:3. It is the national emblem of the Republic of I ...

, flag of Gabon, flag of Guinea, flag of Mali, and flag of Nigeria. The green-white-red tricolour remained a symbol of republicanism throughout the 19th century and was adopted as national flag by a number of states following the

. It was also adopted by the

Kingdom of Sardinia The Kingdom of Sardinia,The name of the state was originally Latin: , or when the kingdom was still considered to include Corsica. In Italian it is , in French , in Sardinian , and in Piedmontese . also referred to as the Kingdom of Savoy-S ...

(inherited by the

Kingdom of Italy The Kingdom of Italy ( it, Regno d'Italia) was a state that existed from 1861, when Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia was proclaimed King of Italy, until 1946, when civil discontent led to an institutional referendum to abandon the monarchy and ...

1861). The

(black-red-gold) originated as the flag of the revolutionary, anti-monarchist

Freikorps (, "Free Corps" or "Volunteer Corps") were irregular German and other European military volunteer units, or paramilitary, that existed from the 18th to the early 20th centuries. They effectively fought as mercenary or private armies, reg ...

of the 1830s and was later adopted by the republicanist bourgeoisie, at the time known as ''Dreifarb'', a German

calque In linguistics, a calque () or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal word-for-word or root-for-root translation. When used as a verb, "to calque" means to borrow a word or phrase from another language ...

of ''Tricolore''. This flag was a symbol of opposition against the German '' Kleinstaaterei'' and the desire for

German Unification The unification of Germany (, ) was the process of building the modern German nation state with federal features based on the concept of Lesser Germany (one without multinational Austria), which commenced on 18 August 1866 with adoption of ...

. It was at first illegal in the

German Confederation The German Confederation (german: Deutscher Bund, ) was an association of 39 predominantly German-speaking sovereign states in Central Europe. It was created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 as a replacement of the former Holy Roman Empire ...

, but was adopted as the national flag at the

Frankfurt Parliament The Frankfurt Parliament (german: Frankfurter Nationalversammlung, literally ''Frankfurt National Assembly'') was the first freely elected parliament for all German states, including the German-populated areas of Austria-Hungary, elected on 1 Ma ...

of 1848/9. The

was introduced in a similar context, in 1831, its colours taken from the flag used in the Brabant Revolution of 1789. The first national flag of the

New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. ...

inspired by this symbolism was the

flag of Mexico The national flag of Mexico ( es, Bandera de México) is a vertical Tricolour (flag), tricolor of green, white, and red with Coat of arms of Mexico, the national coat of arms charge (heraldry), charged in the center of the white stripe. While t ...

, adopted when the

First Mexican Empire The Mexican Empire ( es, Imperio Mexicano, ) was a constitutional monarchy, the first independent government of Mexico and the only former colony of the Spanish Empire to establish a monarchy after independence. It is one of the few modern-era, ...

gained independence from Spain in 1821. After 1848, the young republican

nation state A nation state is a political unit where the state and nation are congruent. It is a more precise concept than "country", since a country does not need to have a predominant ethnic group. A nation, in the sense of a common ethnicity, may i ...

s continued to pick triband designs, but now more prevalently expressing the sentiment of

nationalism Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the State (polity), state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a in-group and out-group, group of peo ...

or ethnic identity than anti-monarchism, the

flag of Hungary The national flag of Hungary ( hu, Magyarország zászlaja) is a horizontal tricolour of red, white and green (red-white-green). In this exact form, it has been the official flag of Hungary since 23 May 1957. The flag's form originates from na ...

(1848), the

Flag of Ireland The national flag of Ireland ( ga, bratach na hÉireann), frequently referred to in Ireland as 'the tricolour' () and elsewhere as the Irish tricolour is a vertical tricolour of green (at the hoist), white and orange. The proportions of th ...

(1848), the flag of Estonia (1880s), the flag of Lithuania (1905), and the

flag of Armenia , Image = Flag of Armenia.svg , Use = 111000 , Symbol = , Proportion = 1:2 , Adoption = 28 May 1918 (re-adopted on 24 August 1990) , Design = A horizontal tricolour of red, blue, and apricot , Designe ...

(1918). By contrast, the flag of Russia was adopted by the

Tsardom of Russia The Tsardom of Russia or Tsardom of Rus' also externally referenced as the Tsardom of Muscovy, was the centralized Russian state from the assumption of the title of Tsar by Ivan IV in 1547 until the foundation of the Russian Empire by Peter I ...

in the late 17th century and while it may or may not have been inspired by the Dutch tricolour, it never had any republican implications. The political ideology of the unification of an ethnic

associated with tricolour flags since the 19th century has resulted in the design of new "tricolours" expressing specific

s in the 20th century, the Pan-African colours adopted in the 1920s for

Pan-Africanism Pan-Africanism is a worldwide movement that aims to encourage and strengthen bonds of solidarity between all Indigenous and diaspora peoples of African ancestry. Based on a common goal dating back to the Atlantic slave trade The Atlantic ...

, chosen in numerous African flags during decolonisation (green-yellow-red, taken from the triband design used by the Solomonic dynasty for the Ethiopian Empire since 1897). The Pan-Arab colors adopted in Arab nationalism 1916 are a comparable concept, even though they combine four, not three, colours. Also in the 20th century, Pan-Iranian colours for

Iranian nationalism Iranian nationalism Persian: ملی‌گرایی ایرانی Baloch: راج دوستی ایرانی Kurdish: نەتەوە پەروەریی ئێرانی Gilaki: ایجانایی ایرانی Azerbaijani: İran millətçiliyi Turkmen: Eýranyň ...

and

Pan-Slavic colors The pan-Slavic colours (or colors) — red, blue and white — were defined by the Prague Slavic Congress, 1848, based on the flag of Russia, which was introduced in the late 17th century. The tricolor flag of Russia was itself inspired by the fl ...

for Slavic nationalism were adopted based on the triband design of the flags used during the 19th century by the

Qajar dynasty The Qajar dynasty (; fa, دودمان قاجار ', az, Qacarlar ) was an IranianAbbas Amanat, ''The Pivot of the Universe: Nasir Al-Din Shah Qajar and the Iranian Monarchy, 1831–1896'', I. B. Tauris, pp 2–3 royal dynasty of Turkic origin, ...

and the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the List of Russian monarchs, Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended th ...

, respectively. The

Indian independence movement The Indian independence movement was a series of historic events with the ultimate aim of ending British Raj, British rule in India. It lasted from 1857 to 1947. The first nationalistic revolutionary movement for Indian independence emerged ...

in 1931 also adopted a tricolour (loan-translated as Hindi, तिरंगा ''Tiraṅgā'') in the traditional symbolism of "national unification" and republican "self-rule" ( Purna Swaraj), adopted as the flag of the Indian Republic in 1947. In 1999, a red, green, and blue tricolour was proposed as the Flag of Mars. The design symbolises

, and also the terraforming of Mars by

human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, culture, ...

ity from a red planet to a green one, and eventually an Earth-like blue one.

Gallery

References

{{colour topics Color schemes Types of flags French Revolution History of liberalism National symbols Political flags Republicanism Revolution Flags by design

History

Gallery

See also

References