A red square flag with a white cross in the centre.
Civil and state ensign of Switzerland
Use
Civil and state ensign
Proportion
2:3
Adopted
1882; 142 years ago (1882)
Design
Red flag with a white cross in the centre and background in red.
The national flag of Switzerland (German: Schweizerfahne; French: drapeau de la Suisse; Italian: bandiera svizzera; Romansh: bandiera da la Svizra; Latin: Vexillum Helvetiae) displays a white cross in the centre of a square red field. The white cross is known as the Swiss cross or the federal cross.[1] Its arms are equilateral, and their ratio of length to width is 7:6. The size of the cross in relation to the field was set in 2017 as 5:8.[2] Alongside the flag of Vatican City, the Swiss flag is one of only two square national flags in the world.[3]
The white cross has been used as the field sign (attached to the clothing of combatants and to the cantonal war flags in the form of strips of linen) of the Old Swiss Confederacy since its formation in the late 13th or early 14th century. Its symbolism was described by the Swiss Federal Council in 1889 as representing "at the same the Christian cross symbol and the field sign of the Old Confederacy".[4] As a national ensign, it was first used during the Napoleonic Wars by general Niklaus Franz von Bachmann, and as regimental flag of all cantonal troops from 1841. The federal coat of arms (eidgenössisches Wappen) was defined in 1815 for the Restored Confederacy as the white-on-red Swiss cross in a heraldic shield. The current design was used together with a cross composed of five squares until 1889, when its dimensions were officially set.[5]
The civil and state ensign of Switzerland, used by Swiss ships, boats and non-governmental bodies, is rectangular in shape and has the more common proportions of 2:3.[6] The emblem of the Red Cross is the Swiss flag with switched colours.
^Flag of Switzerland in German, French and Italian in the online Historical Dictionary of Switzerland.
^Appendix 2, Wappenschutzgesetz (SR 232.21), 21 June 2013 (effective 1 January 2017) [length of an arm: 7 units, width of the cross: 20 units, width of the flag: 32 units; ratio of cross width to field width: 20:32 = 5:8].
^The square shape is due to the shape of late medieval and early modern war flags carried by infantry regiments, while most other national flags, following the example of the British Union flag and the Dutch Prince's Flag, hark back to the tradition of rectangular maritime flags used in the Age of Sail. The communes and cantons of Switzerland also have square flags.
^Cite error: The named reference 1889_636 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^"The coat of arms of the federation is, within a red field, an upright white cross, whose [four] arms of equal length are one and a sixth times as long as they are wide." ("Das Wappen der Eidgenossenschaft ist im rothen Felde ein aufrechtes, freistehendes weißes Kreuz, dessen unter sich gleiche Arme je einen Sechstheil länger als breit sind") Bundesbeschluss betreffend das eidgenössische Wappen vom 12. Dezember 1889
^"Swiss yacht flag". flagsforum. 13 September 2010. Archived from the original on 11 March 2012. Retrieved 3 May 2011.
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