christopher oehler
Keywords: sweden | book of all kingdoms | gotlandia | gotia | stripes |
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Last modified: 2021-08-25 by christopher oehler
Keywords: sweden | book of all kingdoms | gotlandia | gotia | stripes |
Links: FOTW homepage |
search |
disclaimer and copyright |
write us |
mirrors
See also:
![[Cross Flag]](../images/s/se~b1520.gif)
image by
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 13 March 2012
At Sweden in the "Book of All Kingdoms", we have a flag from the Book of all
Kingdoms for Gotlandia, which is a an
8-striped purple and yellow flag.
At Flags of Sweden, 16th Century - 1814, we have early sources regarding the
flag, we have Jaume paraphrasing Klaes
Sierksma telling us that according to Dr. Paul Warming, heraldry advisor of the
Danish kingdom, the flag of Sweden was blue with WHITE cross before 1520.
.![[Striped Flag]](../images/s/se~16th.gif)
image by
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 13 March 2012
This, of course, makes the vexillologist wonder: "How did they get from stripes
to a white cross on blue?" Well, The Lore of Ships [t8c72]??, p.135, has:
"In the second half of the 16th century the present Swedish flag was not yet in
use. Instead, Swedish men-of-war flew a blue-and-white striped flag.. The pattern would fit in between, but would the time frame be
wide enough for that?
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 13 March 2012
![[Pennant with three crowns]](../images/s/se~16tk.gif)
image by
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 14 March 2012
The book then continues, on a new line:
"The pennant at the masthead, however, carried the three Swedish
crowns." As in the illustration the flag is hoisted at the top mast,
this means the pennant flies below the flag.
It's illustrated as a blue over red floating split pennant with three golden
crowns, two over one, near the hoist.
As with e.g. the pennants at <xn-s-a00.html>, the flyward third of the
flag is split.
On the same page are listed:
- "The three-tongued blue flag of the fleet of the army 1761-1813".
The flag is in
normal blue, not in the blue used for the current Swedish flag.
- "The ensign of 1658. from the oldest preserved Swedish flag, now in
Rijksmuseum Amsterdam." The website of the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam shows
this as either of these hits:
Curiously, both have in their description "In de bovenhals vermoedelijk
een koninklijke kroon" - "in the upper hoist presumably a riyal crown".
It appears to be rather a bold assumption, as I don't see the crown at
all. The flag in the book does indeed not show a crown, and is similar
to this one,
except that
it, too, is in normal blue, not in the blue used for the current Swedish
flag as we have it.
(It may even be slightly darker blue, but I'd need another pair of eyes,
and preferably a different copy of the book to be sure.) I guess, the
flag fragments in the Rijksmuseum would be the only way to judge.
- "Merchant flag 1815.1844, with the canton of the Swedish-Norwegian
Union." That would be this one,
but with the saltire
less wide and in a slightly oblong canton, and in 2:3 and standard blue.
- "The ensign with the canton of the Union, 1844-1905,
though with the
split being a third of the flag in depth, and the blue being the
standard blue again.
- "Merchant flag after 1905.", which is Swedish
national flag, except for being 2:3,
rather than 5;8, with the cross being slightly narrower and normal
yellow, rather than the golden shade used for the earlier flags.
The blue, as mentioned, is a lighter shade here. Wasn't there a time in
Swedish flag history when the original shades were restored? Was this
after this book was created in 1963?
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 14 March 2012
