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Some of you may know that, besides my nuttery concerning languages, I also like several other elements within the general realm of anthropology/cultural studies, such as human and political geography, cartography (I'm a colossal map geek), history, and as it turns out, also vexillology, which is the study of flags and flag-making.

Some time last year I first got acquainted with a small Java program called FlagMaker (which is also available in installable format but I haven't gotten it to work yet :P ) and had been having a bit of fun with it. The great thing about FlagMaker is it actually has the technical terms for some flag design elements written into the program, but some are replaced with more generic terms. Ever wondered though, what you call it when a flag does something? You're about to find out. (Thanks to Wikipedia and flagandbanner.com)

Let's start with the basics. The main part of a flag is called a field, and while this can sometimes be alternating stripes (or in heraldic terms, bars; see the USA, Malaysia, and for more irregular examples, Costa Rica and Thailand), it is often one or two solid colours (the latter called a bicolo(u)r and represented by such flags as Poland, Ukraine, and Liechtenstein horizontally, and Malta, San Marino, the Vatican City, and Algeria vertically.) A flag of three even-sized bars, either vertical or horizontal, is called a tricolo(u)r, and it's arguably the most common type of flag. The most historically famous tricolo(u)r is the French flag (which is called the tricolore anyway), which is a vertical tricolo(u)r, as are a good number of the flags of Africa, including some nations whose flags are almost identical, such as Mali's and Guinea's for example. Here's a basic example: 

[Image: Vertical-Tricolor.png]

Horizontal tricolo(u)rs include flags such as Germany, Hungary, India, Iran, Russia, and so forth. A basic example:

[Image: Horizontal-Tricolour.png]

But say the flag has the same colour to each side and a different colour down the middle. The name then depends on the orientation of the stripe. For example, a vertical bar of a differing colour is called a pale. This is the first of the charges I will mention, where something is considered added to the field:
[Image: Pale.png]
Canada is the best example I could think of of such a flag. It's much more common to have a fess, which is a horizontal differing bar. Many Latin American countries, especially in Central America, have fesses, as also does Austria and one could sort of argue North Korea, although it's typically when the centre stripe is 40% or less of the height of the flag. :P

There's also a third kind of bisecting bar, known as a bend. These tend to be narrower than your average fess or pale and have subnames based on which direction they are pointing. But the nomenclature can be confusing, because it comes from heraldic conventions for the symbols on a shield, so it is actually "backwards." This is why a flag that, from the viewer's vantage point, has a line rising from left to right, is called a bend sinister...

[Image: Bend-Sinister.png]

And from right to left, a bend dexter.

[Image: Bend-Dexter.png]

Most of the examples of bends in today's national flags are bends sinister, such as in the flags of Tanzania, St. Kitts and Nevis, Namibia, and the Republic of Congo, among others. The only bend dexter in the strictest sense is on the flag of Trinidad and Tobago. When a bend has narrower stripes on either side thereof, it is said to be cotised, or have two cotises. You never use the term "border" for it as that is something specific in vexillological terminology.

Finally, we have a combination of the two types of bends, resulting in a saltire. These were more common historically (for example, the Spanish and Russian Empires both used saltires in various ways, and the Confederate States' main charge was also a saltire. but still appear in flags such as Jamaica's, Scotland's, and the flag of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. Jamaica's an interesting one that we'll come back to in a sec! ;) Then there's also the Union Jack of the United Kingdom, which is the marriage of two saltires with yet another type of charge - a symmetrical cross.

[Image: Symmetrical-Cross.png]

This design appears in the flag of the country of Georgia, the Dominican Republic, and the UK consituent country of England among others. The flag of the UK took the cross of the flag of England (St. George's Cross) and stuck it on top of the Scottish flag with its St. Andrew's Cross (the first of the two saltires I mentioned) to form the original UK flag, which was later supplemented by the red half-saltire representing the traditional red-saltire St. Patrick's Cross of Ireland.

But there's another kind of cross that pops up on flags, more or less exclusively in Northern Europe these days although it was also used in Germany at one point - the Nordic cross:

[Image: Nordic-Cross.png]

A third kind of cross, the couped cross, occurs only on the flag of Switzerland. This is where the cross doesn't extend to the edges of the flag. It is also called a Greek cross, although on the current flag of Greece the cross actually does extend to the edges... of the canton at least. Speaking of cantons, they are basically boxes on the hoist side of the flag:

[Image: Canton.png]
Notable flags with cantons include the USA, Malaysia, and several Oceanian states (most notably Australia and New Zealand) where most of them have the UK Union Jack there.

A similar charge is a chevron, which is a triangle whose vertical centre matches that of the flag. Some examples thereof include those of the Czech Republic, Cuba, Jordan, and The Philippines, as well as the US Territory of Puerto Rico. A more generic example is given below:

[Image: Chevron.png]

Guyana in particular has a multi-layered chevron in its flag.

There is also a border or bordure. The terminology is very specific. It is not only around the edge of the flag, but it has to be visible. A super-thin "border" simply there for definition purposes is called a fimbration, and when made from embroidered or tasselled fabric can be called a fringe. Traditionally, borders/bordures are at least a sixth of the flag/shield thick (refer to the flag of The Maldives), although some modern-day examples are a bit slimmer (Montenegro or Sri Lanka for example).

Besides these, there are also ways of dividing the field. There are those patterns called (party) per - that is, appearing as if they were divided by a certain set of diagonal lines. The word "party" is traditionally part of the name but is often left out. These are relatively rare in the world's flags, but they are attested. For example, you have the flag of Bhutan Bhutan which is a (party) per bend sinister, like the generic example given below:

[Image: Per-Bend-Sinister.png]

There is also exactly one party per bend dexter amongst national flags of the world, in Papua New Guinea's flag. Here's a more general look at a party per bend dexter:

[Image: Per-Bend-Dexter.png]

There is no "pure" (party) per bend saltire amongst the world's national flags, but there is a hybrid! Jamaica has a golden saltire with a per bend saltire field of green and black!

[Image: 320px-Flag_of_Jamaica.svg.png]

There is, however, no "party per cross" by name. It's called a quadrisection.

[Image: Quadrisection.png]

The first flag that comes to my mind with this is Panama's. 

There's another kind of line-based charge that exists, and that is the pall, not to be confused with a pale. Think of a flag with a chevron, then imagine if there were a thick line around the chevron flowing into a line going down the centre of the flag. A split fess of sorts. Unlike with bends, there are no special names for differing thicknesses. It's just... a pall. :P

[Image: Pall.png]

I'll leave it here for now. I might come back and talk about different kinds of symbols that can function as charges!
Interersting stuff :D ! I already knew some of the more basic terms (such as the canton and the field), but I didn't know many of the more obscure ones. And I certainly didn't know about the uniqueness of the flags of Switzerland and Papua New Guinea!

(Maybe this will give me some ideas - and inspire me to get back into flag design :lol: )