Talk:Flag of Germany

Flag templates

These are used to maintain information about flags.

Main page: Wikipedia:WikiProject Flag Template

Template call	Result
{{flag|DEU}}	DEU
{{flag|Germany}}	Germany
{{flag|West Germany}}	West Germany
{{flag|East Germany}}	East Germany
{{flag|Nazi Germany}}	Nazi Germany
{{flag|Weimar Republic}}	Weimar Republic
{{flag|German Empire}}	German Empire

Country data

• Template: Country data Germany
• Template: Country data West Germany
• Template: Country data East Germany
• Template: Country data Nazi Germany
• Template: Country data Weimar Republic
• Template: Country data German Empire

German Empire flag

According to Gordon A. Craig's Germany 1866-1945, page 58, "Germany had no national flag until 1892." Should not, therefore the caption for the German Empire flag read 1892-1918, rather than 1871-1918. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 142.231.72.246 (talk) 17:09, 29 December 2006 (UTC).

Civil Ensign

hmmm i believe the flag of teh third reich (the swatztika one) may be wrong. As theres one in my flag book with it in the centre that eagel thing on it the stwasttika is on the side. Altough it is the State Flag maybe this one is the civil flag i dont know. - fonzy

• itsd the Civil Ensign its used at sea

Layout suggestion

This article needs to be edited to change the layout. The first paragraph is very hard to read; it is too compressed. Perhaps, putting the text below the image would solve this problem.

• I believe this is a reference to text being squeezed between images on both sides. Probably due to an editor using a wide screen and not realizing what happens on common smaller screens. I shuffled the images. (SEWilco 03:47, 27 Jun 2005 (UTC))

Corrections, more detail

I added some additional details to this article, as well as some of the corrections I felt were necessary. One or two changes are fairly noticeable, so I think I should explain:

1) a diplomatic envoy flag is not an official national flag; the black-white-red was abolished during the weimar republic as far as I know. I am not certain why international representatives would don a flag that is discontinued, but I have heard that statistic before. Anyway, I removed the less-than official flag.

2) the german confederation, while in operation well into the 1860's, did not carry the black-red-gold flag so closely associated with the 1848 experiment. Its adaptation as such was only temporary. The monarchies wouldn't want to touch that thing with a ten-foot poll because it reeked of radicalism and has always referenced something disfavorable to the royalist cause. 3) the "red of the bird's tongue" theory behind the black-red-gold color scheme is absurd. I am certain it is a reference to the black and gold monarchy, with the red obviously representing the Hanseatic trading league of the past, so closely associated with the growth of Germany.--68.81.242.37 13:45, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Could somebody upload that to commons?

Haven't got the faintest idea how it works.

Thats what is needed: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bild:FlaggeHRRHochmittelalter_upload.JPG (It's the mediaveal Flag of the Holy Roman Empire which was not associated with the Kaiser (Imperator) but with the Nation; flag was in use aproximately from 1200 up to 1350, a good source to proof its correct would be: http://www.flaggenlexikon.de/fdtlhi1r.htm )

Thank you in advance. Foreigner 12:46, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

addendum: please have a look at the flag at the right side of the pictur:

The Battle of Laupen (1339) between Swiss forces and an army of the Dukes of Savoy Even so the picture was painted by (Diebold Schilling the Elder, in 1480s it still shows the old german red flag with a white cross upon it.

It proofs, that the Swiss used the mediaeval flag of the nation a g a i n s t everybody who attacked the freedom be it the duke of savoy or the habsburgian emperor, (who of course used the imperial eagle). Switzerland uses still today the old national flag of mediaeval germany. Foreigner 13:17, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Good work. As you can see, that has already been done. The site seems credible and the claims are believable. However, I would caution against entitling this the "national" flag as I am almost certain that it was not universally adapted. The picture to the right also seems to illustrate this point.--Hohns3 04:29, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. // Well, it's a rather difficult question to what extent it was adapted. There's detailed work to bee done by the historians. Foreigner 10:41, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

second addendom: It seems that the Swiss captured "the" flag from the Duke of Burgund (House of Savoy) who used/misused "the" flag. Later both, the Swiss and the House of Savoy used "the" flag. In the picture the Swiss infantry is on the right side of the picture. Please compare and veryfy reading the lemma Battle of Laupen. Foreigner 08:21, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

It seems clear that a cross was somewhat universally adapted by German ancients, to nobody's surprise. However, I'm not completely sold on the Swiss/Burgundy/Frank combination being a nationlike expression of German-ness..."Flag of Regional Medieval Germans" or "Flag of Regional Frankish and Swiss Germans" might work. It would be nice if you could find a second source to back up the claims found on lexicon and provide a second opinion on how it should be titled. --Hohns3 03:07, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Disagree with removement of the flag

It's documented that a German wikipedian created the flag. Please read the discussion of the picture. 217.64.171.188 07:35, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

swastika flag 'Now forbidden by the democrats as "hate crime" '

This sentence is a bit strange. First of all its not called a hate crime (or Hassverbrechen) in Germany but rather "symbol against the constitution" (verfassungsfeindliches Symbol). The second thing is: Who are "the democrats"? The flag was forbidden first by the occupying powers (Britain, USA, etc.) and later by the German government.217.85.110.56 20:08, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

It was meant to be similar to the caption of the Third Reich flag (tit-for-tat). ( 'Then'→'Now' etc.) I admit that "hate crime" was only a descriptive term; The point was that it is illegal for its 'hateful' connotations. I'll change that. How about "Currently illegal in Germany"?. By the way, is it mere possession, purchase or public display that is illegal? Hm. Anyway, thanks for telling! --CAD6DEE2E8DAD95A (hello!) 21:37, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

In case you want to know: Technically, there is no such thing as a "hate crime" in Germany, in terms of legislation, at least not with the connotations the term has in the USA. — Mütze 12:18, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Purchase and public display are illegal in Germany. But there are exceptions: If you add a (critical) comment (e.g. in school books) public display is allowed.— Hossi 20:12, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Disposing of german flag

What is the proper way o dispose of the german flag? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cuhl33 (talk • contribs) 17:12, 6 March 2007 (UTC).

Take it to the recycling center or chuck it in the bin. It's just a bit of rag in particular colours, same as any other flag. 77.22.178.230 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:46, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

Flag from 1871-1892?

What was the Empire's flag from 1871-1892? Funnyhat 06:25, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

I think that this is quite simply wrong, as the imperial constitution of 16 April 1871, article 55, states: Die Flagge der Kriegs- und Handelsmarine ist schwarz-weiß-roth. – in English: The flag of the navy and the merchant marine is black-white-red. --SKopp 22:38, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I just added the flag that you are talking about. I found it on the Nordic Cross Flag page. --Volker89 12:40, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

I've had a lot of run-ins with Original Research which I learned is forbidden on wikipedia and the belief that this flag was the German flag from 1871-1892 is original research. Almost all sources which show the Imperial black-white-red tricolour say it was used from 1871-1918, this is the first time I have ever seen this flag, even though I'm an avid one for flag history. Plus, if, as SKopp pointed out, the German constitution of 1871 said that the tricolour was the flag along with the fact that most sources say that the flag is the black-white-red tricolour, wikipedia cannot have this "1871-1892" flag on the German flag site, because as said earlier, it is original research. Also I think questions should be raised at the Nordic Cross Flag page with those who posted that flag to find out where they got their information, because their original research is rippling across wikipedia's flags pages. --R-41 20:25, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I haven't seen that flag before either. But I know now where that 1892 thing comes from. The black-white-red tricolor was declared to be the national flag by the Verordnung über die Führung der Reichsflagge of 8 November 1892; while the text of this decree is apparently not available online, it is mentioned here for example (the information there is otherwise inaccurate at the time I write this, though, for reasons I will explain presently). This may have been the first time that there was a decree clearly saying, our national flag looks like this. But before that there was the constitution, clearly specifying the colors. So black-white-red was indeed the official flag of the Reich from 1871 on.

One might now say that this mysterious "cross" flag is also black-white-red, if not a tricolor, and the constitution doesn't declare how the colors should be arranged. But the constitution of 1871 was closely modelled on the constitution of the North German Federation of 1867, and as it happens this article 55 is word-for-word identical to article 55 of the constitution of the North German Federation. But that constitution was followed up by a decree specifying the shape on 25 October 1867, which reads:

Die Bundesflagge [...] bildet ein längliches Rechteck, bestehend aus drei gleich breiten horizontalen Streifen, von welchen der obere schwarz, der mittlere weiß und der untere rot ist. Das Verhältniß der Höhe der Flagge zur Länge ist zwei zu drei.

In English:

The federal flag forms an oblong rectangle, consisting of three equally broad horizontal stripes, of which the upper is black, the medial white, and the lower red. The ratio between the height of the flag and the length is two to three.

It seems obvious to me that the 1871 Reich would have adopted this flag as well. Why would it abandon the flag only to reintroduce it in 1892? And if that was so, frankly, I have the feeling I would know it. --SKopp 03:14, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with SKopp, it seems very reasonable that the flags and symbols of the North German Confederation were simply re-adopted as those of the German Empire, after all, let's keep in mind that the black-white-red tricolour was only four years old when the German Empire was formed, it seems highly unlikely that they would choose a radically different flag all of a sudden, especially in the very conservative nation that Germany was in 1871. More likely, this cross flag was either a proposed flag for Germany, or an unofficial flag used by German citizens.--R-41 19:49, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Shade of red for Third Reich flag

I've noticed that the shade of red for the German imperial flag and weimar/present flag is darker than the red commonly used for the Nazi flag. Considering that the Nazis used the German Imperial flag for a few years, would their red naturally correspond with the German imperial flag, or was the Nazi flag officially a bright red along with a bright-red version of the imperial tricolour?--R-41 14:41, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Merge proposal

The separate article Flag of Nazi Germany contains a lot of content that already appears in this article. There are no separate articles for other German historical flags. Therefore, to reduce repetition, and to make management easier, I suggest that the two articles be combined.

As part of this merge, this article should then be reorganised a bit. For example, the large "Origins" section could be broken down into the different historical stages to match the column of flag images. Once broken up like this, it would then be possible to expand upon the different periods (e.g. as done in the German wiki article Flagge Deutschlands). - 52 Pickup 18:33, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree, a separate article for the flag of Nazi Germany is unnecessary when it could be described in the Flag of Germany page. User:R-41

Alright. I'm currently working on a major reconstruction and expansion of this article. There's a few things to go through, but incorporating the Nazi flag article will then be part of this work. - 52 Pickup 11:59, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

2nd merge proposal

Recently, another merge request was placed on the page, suggesting that National colours of Germany be merged with the History section. Since the proposer didn't mention it here on the talk page, I thought I would. The national colours article contains a lot of information already on this page, and is very small when compared with the corresponding de-wiki articles (de:Schwarz-Rot-Gold and de:Schwarz-Weiß-Rot). As part of my current work on this article, I've already been using content from these articles for ideas, so I have no problem with the merge. Not many countries have a national colours article anyway. - 52 Pickup 19:21, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose I think this should be an article of its own, since the colors are used not only in flags and the current German flag does not display the black-white-red of the former flag, a color combination still used by some German sports teams. However, the articles should be clearly crosslinked. John Anderson 11:19, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Waldeck

The flag of Waldeck_(state) looks the same -- any connection? 129.31.71.161 20:05, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

This is a tough one, I'm finding contradictory explanations. The de-wiki claims that the colours were used by Waldeck from at least 1815, citing Waldeck's anthem (5th verse) - but the text given is from 1890 and only the melody is from 1815, and from what I've seen so far, the previous text makes no mention of the colours (although I might not have found the full text yet). Meanwhile FOTW says that black-red-yellow was used by Waldeck's militia as of 1814. FOTW also says that yellow on black were Waldeck's colours in 1692 and suggests that black-red-yellow was used from even as far back as 1775.
The black-red-gold flag was definitely in use after 1848, apparently because Waldeck was one of the states that signed onto the failed 1848 constitution, which gave the tricolour as its national colours (this still needs verification). So the colours pre-1848 are still a bit unclear. - 52 Pickup 07:47, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Weimar flag

The article insinuates that the current flag is the same as the flag of the Weimar republic, having simply been re-adopted after it had temporarily been retired by the Nazis. E.g.:

The current flag, first used in the 1848 revolution, was adopted in its present form on 11 August 1919 in the constitution of the Weimar Republic.

Or:

11 August 1919 (2:3) Re-adopted 23 May 1949

Is that really correct? The 1848 flag seems to be identical to the 1919 flag, so what about "its present form"? Even worse, the Weimar flag actually does not represent the present form, because it has a different aspect ratio. I think the sentence is misleading – the current form was adopted on 23 May 1949. --SKopp 22:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

By "its present form", this refers just to the black-red-gold tricolour and not the aspect ratio. Perhaps this should be reworded to reflect this. More about the aspect ratio: the 19th-century flag had no defined aspect ratio, while the ratio for the modern flag was set on 7 July 1950, just over a year after the flag was (re)introduced. - 52 Pickup 18:17, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

All right, I changed the article to clarify that 1919 wasn't the first use of the current flag, in the sense that if you speak loosely (and ignore the aspect ratio) it was used much earlier, but not by the nation-state that was founded in 1871; whereas if you speak strictly, the 1919 flag was simply not the same as the 1949 one. --SKopp 00:58, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Quick-failed GA nomination

Per the quick-fail criteria, any article that contains cleanup or expansion banners (such as the multiple merge banners now present) must be failed immediately and does not require an in-depth review. Please resolve any issues brought up by such banners and remove them before choosing to renominate the article. If you feel this review was in error, you may request a reassessment. Thank you for your work so far, VanTucky 04:41, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Merge issues now resolved - 2 merged (Flag of Nazi Germany, Flag of the GDR), 1 not merged (National colours of Germany) - so now renominating. - 52 Pickup ^(deal) 05:14, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Second GA nonination

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

   All important facts should show citations. For example, if a statement of a person as the one of Albert Speer is shown, there should be a reference

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

   There are not two, but 3 states, which use the schwarz rot gold flag. (Saarland)
   The legal bases of the flag are not shown. Black red gold are mentioned in the Grundgesetz (Art 22 GG), but there is no statement about size and badges.

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   only minor problems, which should be corrected in time--Thw1309 (talk) 15:21, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. In response:

• 2a - I thought that since the text read Albert Speer, in his book "Inside the Third Reich", stated that "...", an explicit citation was duplicative. Never mind. This has now been changed.
• 3a - The omission of Saarland was a silly mistake on my part, since Saarland wasn't a state at the time of the formation of the FRG I forgot to include it later on. This is now fixed.
• 3a (2) - No, the Grundgesetz does not mention size and badges. These specifications were made later as stated:
  • Start of "Design" section: Following specifications set by the (West) German government in 1950, the flag displays three bars of equal width and has a width-length ratio of 3:5 (ref #4)
  • In "Vertical flags" section: The proportions of these vertical flags were not specified until 1996, when a ratio of 5:2 was established. (ref #3) The 1996 reform also specified the layout for the vertical version of the state flag: the Bundesschild is displayed in the centre of the flag, overlapping with up to one fifth of the black and yellow bands.

52 Pickup ^(deal) 20:39, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

The Speer quote is only an example, although I think, that all quotes should have their references. Another example. The whole part about the Urburschenschaft only has one quote. But I can live with this, we are talking about good article, not about featured article.

I have corrected the flag of the Urburschenschaft and added the constitutional text.

Now I think, this meets the quality of a good article. Congratulations--Thw1309 (talk) 20:43, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Gunpowder, blood and glory ?!?

I heard a story that the German colours “black, red and gold” stand for “gunpowder, blood and glory”. This sounds a bit ridiculous, but it was explained to me that the German flag was based on the uniforms of the Lützow_Free_Corps . Their uniforms where allegedly black, with red collars and had golden oak-leave decorations. Therefore the martial meaning of the uniforms was transferred onto the flag. Can anyone shed some light on this matter? Is this complete non-sense, has a seed of truth in it or is it actually accurate? Just wondering!

HagenUK (talk) 09:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

See the Napoleonic War and German Confederation parts of the History section for the role of the Free Corps in the history of the colours. As for the “gunpowder, blood and glory” part, there were a number of contemporary interpretations, a similar one is given in the article. - 52 Pickup (deal) 09:25, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

It is actually the somewhat most impressive poem describing the national flag of Germany (I say nothing about its lyric value, of course, neither do I think the same as to opinion - but impressive it is), which is cited in the German wikipedia and states: "Black, red, gold / in misery and darkness / that's where we were to save them / and now save them we did indeed / save them out of their coffins! Ah, how that flash's and rush's and rolls! Hurray, thou black, thou red, thou gold! Gunpowder's black, blood is red, golden the flickering flame! // The old Imperial Banner's here / and these the ancient coulours / and holding these we strike and take / some new scars for our own skin. / For yet the beginnning's begun / but not the final battle won: / Gunpowder's black, blood is red, golden the flickering flame! // [...] Our freedom is: the Nation / is equal of all districts! / Our freedom is: the auction / of thirty hats of sovereigns! / Our freedom is: the Republic / we sing again: the Republic: / Gunpowder's black, blood is red, golden the flickering flame! [...]" by Ferdinand Freilingrath

Some other would say less but still martially: black is the past, red the present of fighting, golden the future. Still some other would say it's the old imperial banner (black eagle with red mouth and some gold on its edges), but that's quite certainly an interpretation that was only retrospective once the coulours were already there (but that's true for the gunpowder stuff too of course). The most probable origin is that these were just the colours easily available for the Lützow corps. --84.154.105.221 (talk) 08:50, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

FAC notes

Following the recent successful promotion of this article to FA, here is a summary of some of the points for consideration for further work:

• A new section on the various symbols used on the flag through history: must be careful not to simply incorporate Coat of arms of Germany, which should remain a separate article.
• Separate section of flag protocol: while some relevant information is already present in various sections, other flag FAs have such a section. While there is no standard format for flag articles, it's worth keeping in mind.
• Manufacturing: is there any specific information here? I couldn't find any so far.
• Copy-editing: although the article has passed FAC, a final polish by someone else would be nice.
• Splitting the article? Opinion was divided on whether or not the History section should be in its own article. Personally, I'd prefer to have everything together.

There are a few other points that were raised by the nomination. See FAC (note that the nomination was restarted) for more information. - 52 Pickup (deal) 06:37, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Flag days: former Day of German Unity 17th June

In the Flag Days Box, the "n/a" against June 17th should be replaced with "former Day of German Unity 1953-1990". I left Germany for good in 1975, and 33 years later I still feel strongly that the Day of German Unity should not have been moved to October. The 17th of June was East Germany's Tiananmen Square and should not be forgotten or sidelined. Thanks, Renata (talk) 05:18, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Anti-Nazi profanity

When I look at the article, at the end of the lead section I see the following text:

FAGGGGOOOOOOTTT NAZIIIIII NAZIIII

But when I went to edit it I couldn't see it anymore. I checked again and saw it again. Then I looked at the history and saw that this line had been removed from some vandalism earlier. How come I can still see it, after the vandalism was reverted? Jake the Editor Man _(talk) 20:29, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Bypass your cache. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:35, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Wrong King

In the section "Prussian-dominated Germany" it states that "King Frederick William IV of Prussia was satisfied with the colour choice" of the North German Cofederation flag, but Frederick William had died in 1861, 5 years before the Confederation was founded and acquired a flag. I assume that William I of Prussia is actually meant here. Cplakidas (talk) 12:39, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

placement of imgs

The MoS for images suggests that images be placed both right and left in more or less alternating order (but avoid sandwiching). Most of the images in this article at on the right hand side, so it might be worthwhile to change the layout of some images Jasy jatere (talk) 14:29, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd say the article could certainly stand to have some of the images shifted to the left, particularly in the portion about half way down where there are a large number of right-aligned images. It would have to be tested to see if it looks ok, of course, and since I'm useless with images I'll leave it to someone else Adacore (talk) 09:14, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to have all flags on the right side, while other images may also be on the left. -- Matthead  Discuß   20:30, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Name of Flag

The name of the the German flag is "Bundesflagge", not "Schwarz-Rot-Gold". 84.62.125.217 (talk) 19:30, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Good point. I was just going to change that in the article. De728631 (talk) 17:15, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to remove date-autoformatting

Dear fellow contributors

MOSNUM no longer encourages date autoformatting, having evolved over the past year or so from the mandatory to the optional after much discussion there and elsewhere of the disadvantages of the system. Related to this, MOSNUM prescribes rules for the raw formatting, irrespective of whether a date is autoformatted or not). MOSLINK and CONTEXT are consistent with this.

There are at least six disadvantages in using date-autoformatting, which I've capped here:

Disadvantages of date-autoformatting

• (1) In-house only

• (a) It works only for the WP "elite".
• (b) To our readers out there, it displays all-too-common inconsistencies in raw formatting in bright-blue underlined text, yet conceals them from WPians who are logged in and have chosen preferences.
• (c) It causes visitors to query why dates are bright-blue and underlined.

• (2) Avoids what are merely trivial differences

• (a) It is trivial whether the order is day–month or month–day. It is more trivial than color/colour and realise/realize, yet our consistency-within-article policy on spelling (WP:ENGVAR) has worked very well. English-speakers readily recognise both date formats; all dates after our signatures are international, and no one objects.

• (3) Colour-clutter: the bright-blue underlining of all dates

• (a) It dilutes the impact of high-value links.
• (b) It makes the text slightly harder to read.
• (c) It doesn't improve the appearance of the page.

• (4) Typos and misunderstood coding

• (a) There's a disappointing error-rate in keying in the auto-function; not bracketing the year, and enclosing the whole date in one set of brackets, are examples.
• (b) Once autoformatting is removed, mixtures of US and international formats are revealed in display mode, where they are much easier for WPians to pick up than in edit mode; so is the use of the wrong format in country-related articles.
• (c) Many WPians don't understand date-autoformatting—in particular, how if differs from ordinary linking; often it's applied simply because it's part of the furniture.

• (5) Edit-mode clutter

• (a) It's more work to enter an autoformatted date, and it doesn't make the edit-mode text any easier to read for subsequent editors.

• (6) Limited application

• (a) It's incompatible with date ranges ("January 3–9, 1998", or "3–9 January 1998", and "February–April 2006") and slashed dates ("the night of May 21/22", or "... 21/22 May").
• (b) By policy, we avoid date autoformatting in such places as quotations; the removal of autoformatting avoids this inconsistency.

Removal has generally been met with positive responses by editors. Does anyone object if I remove it from the main text in a few days’ time on a trial basis? The original input formatting would be seen by all WPians, not just the huge number of visitors; it would be plain, unobtrusive text, which would give greater prominence to the high-value links. Tony (talk) 11:45, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Xenophobia?

I wonder if the following sentence, however goodintentioned, should be edited? "The utilisation of the old imperial tricolour by the far right and its attempts to associate the tricolour with its antidemocratic and xenophobic ideals are strongly objected to by modern German monarchists."

Xenophobia, according to it's wikipage, is: an intense dislike and/or fear of people from other countries. It comes from the Greek words ξένος (xenos), meaning "foreigner," "stranger," and φόβος (phobos), meaning "fear." (I think the last dot could be edited on "fear." as well, but that's another story)

1. Xenophobia sounds more like a disorder, as in "arachnophobia" or "social phobia". As such I think the proper terminology, RACIST is more apropriate.

2. This sounds like they hate ANY foreigner, including their european neighbours. However, they do have mass-meetings with russians, norwegians and swedes present. So xenophobic can not be the proper word to use here.

3. How can a group have a phobic ideal? Sort of "you know, that group with their arachnophobic ideals?". A phobia is a disorder, it is not an ideal you work towards ataining.

4. Why the fear of using the word "racists"? They are racists. And have racist ideals. End of story.

"Xenophobic ideal" = protectionism; it means mistrust of non-Germans. While modern Germany does indeed reach out to its neighbours, the sentence above does not say "the utilisation... by Germany...," it says "the utilisation... by the far right..." The far right was indeed xenophobic and did have protectionist ideals. Alles klar? Wilhelm_meis (talk) 09:10, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

I think that sentence suffered from a German to English translation. In Germany the term "racist" is not commonly used because it promotes the idea of human races---something the Nazis were very fond of... 85.216.116.200 (talk) 10:44, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Alleged "Nordic Cross" flag of the Weimar Republic

There has never been such a flag proposal in 1919. The proposal could have taken place in 1926. But never officially discussed in the german parliament anyway.--217.185.115.74 (talk) 18:16, 2 August 2009 (UTC) This flag was one of the 2 flags proposed for West Germany, the other is the current flag. German Resistance Flag Proposal 1944.svg — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.239.183.233 (talk) 13:43, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Black-White-Red Tricolor banned as "reactionary" by the Nazis ??

The Black-White-Red Tricolor was never banned as "reactionary". On the contrary. Officially the flag continued to be a flag "of honour" after 1935 ! Hermann Göring himself proclaimed in a speech in the German Reichstag on 17. September 1935:

Die alte Flagge, sie ist in Ehren eingerollt worden. Sie gehört einem vergangenen Deutschland der Ehre an. (...) Die Achtung, die wir vor der alten Flagge schwarz-weiß-rot haben, zwingt uns zu verhindern und zu verhüten, dass diese Farben und diese Flagge herabgewürdigt werden zu einem Parteiwimpel, unter dem sich als Siegeszeichen die Reaktion verborgen hält.

That means that the Nazis tried to prevent the conservative "right" to use the Black-White-Red flag for their own purposes, but Black-White-Red was called "a flag of honour" !

--Gomeira (talk) 16:09, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Well yes, as they did with most "reactionary" stuff. However, the very speech of Göring you cite shows that they seem to have felt a need to replace it as a now-party-flag of Prussian reactionaries. They pretended (and, what is more difficult, perhaps felt) that they did this in honour of the flag, but still that's how it stands. --77.4.70.195 (talk) 18:55, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

"Neo-Nazi march in Munich" picture

What does it make it a neo-Nazi march? I mean the protesters don't carry Nazi flags not have they any any visible Nazi signs. They are carrying an Imperial flag, which has nothing to do with the Nazi era. Norum (talk) 15:12, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

WWII Battle Flags

I have a old WWII German Battle Flage, I would like to find out where it's from and what it was use for. The flag is 51 inches long by 28 inches wide, red back ground white center circle with black. in the upper left corner a gray eagel, eagle is looking left and has the letters NSKK above it. would love to find out more about this flag. any one can email me at johndyer_670@msn.com

Look here: Flags of the NSKK--Gomeira (talk) 15:20, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Flag used officially between 1933 and 1935

Do we have any evidence, which flag was actually used by the German government as the official German flag between 1933 and 1935 when the "dual flag arrangement" was effective? The article mentions one incidence that clarifies that the swastika was used as the naval ensign during this period, but it is not conclusive whether this case can be generalized to all official flags. Tomeasy _{T C} 07:22, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Does this help?

"Erlass des Reichpräsidenten über die vorläufige Regelung der Flaggenhissung". Reichsgesetzblatt (in German). 12 March 1933. p. 103. Retrieved 2010-07-16. Am heutigen Tage, an dem in ganz Deutschland die alten schwarz-weiß-roten Fahnen zu Ehren unserer Gefallenen auf Halbmast wehen, bestimme ich, daß vom morgigen Tage bis zur endgültigen Regelung der Reichsfarben die schwarz-weiß-rote Fahne und die Hakenkreuzflagge gemeinsam zu hissen sind. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |trans_title= (help)

--Boson (talk) 22:15, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Well thanks, but this is already in the article and explains the "dual flag arrangement". My question focuses more on practical use. did Germany really use always both flags or did they give prevalence to one of them when, e.g., receiving state visits? There are so many pictures I recall from Nazi Germany that show the Swastika, but do we official usage between 1933 and 1935 of it, or perhaps even more surprising, photos of the empire flag being used officially.

I think it would be worth to add something about official usage with during the time of the dual flag arrangement, if we had evidence for this. Tomeasy _{T C} 07:06, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Here you can read a lot about the flag use during that period:[1]. Everything is corroborated by very good sources (Original documents, german vexillological bulletins and books).--Gomeira (talk) 09:03, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Indeed the article is very informative with respect to the subject. It gives a lot of detail about the varieties of official flags used between 1933 and 1945. I think, i will add it as a source to the corresponding section in our article.

However, it does not talk about the implementation of the dual flag rule in practice. Was it really common practice to host both national flags at official occasions? Or was it sometimes one and sometimes the other? Or was it usually this one and sometimes the other? That's what I am after, and that's what I consider needed also for this article. It is easy to say, there were two national flags at the same time. But doesn't that trigger the reader to ask, which one was used then. Tomeasy _{T C} 11:01, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

All information that is available for me definitely states that both, the swastika flag and the Black-White-Red striped flag were used from 1933 to 1935 jointly as National flags. The so called "Bremen-incident" is a good example for this practise (described in DAVIS: "Flags and standards of the Third Reich", 1975.) On July, 26, 1935 members of a Anti-Nazi demonstration in New York tore down the swastika flag from the German ship "Bremen" and threw it into the Hudson River. The Black-White-Red flag, which was flown at the stern was not affected. Answering the following German protest as to the "desecration" of the German National flag, the American side maintained that the swastika flag was only the Party flag, the Black-White-Red national flag had not been damaged. This finally led to the change of the German flag law in 1935, where the swastika flag was defined as the only German National flag.--Gomeira (talk) 09:11, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

In many places in Wikipedia, there are tables where names of people or organisations are accompanied by the national flag that was contemporary to their activity. If German representatives in 1934 are to be treated consistently with others, a decision needs to be made as to which of two flags needs to be shown in the articles. Occasionally, we might be able to see contemporary sources that indicate which flag was favoured by the organisers, but in the absence of that, what is the best advice users here, presumably with some knowledge on the subject, can offer as to which flag would be more suitable for use, for example, to illustrate Leipzig's hosting of the 1934 World Road cycling championships (example currently in contention with Tomeasy carefully avoided). Kevin McE (talk) 20:01, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Even though there is an issue in contention, I agree with your comment here. This is exactly the question that I would like to solve. Tomeasy _{T C} 22:08, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I wouldn't see any problems if the swastika flag was used in order to illustrate the mentioned articles. Since the Nazis took over the power in 1933 and the swastika flag was their symbol it would remind readers that the Nazis already had the power in 1933 and not only in 1935.--Gomeira (talk) 07:37, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I also think that the Swastika flag should be used to represent Germany from 1933-1935, and of course also later until 1945. Tomeasy _{T C} 16:53, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

I think there was a time after the Seize of Power when the official flag still was black-red-gold (or black-white-red with black-red-gold in the upper edge), the government thus breaking the law. Anyway, what concerns the Bremen incident the Americans were right. Black-white-red was the state, swastika was the party. It was the Nazi officials who were mistaken about this. (What concerns the wikipedia in Nazi-specific topics, black-white-red would of course be misleading. However, it could and imho should be used with nationalities of sportsmen participating in sports events, and the like.) --93.133.198.77 (talk) 08:18, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Meaning?

Is it worth mentioning the "In the night, through the blood, to the light." theory of the meaning of the colors and their sequence? 72.160.140.111 (talk) 00:13, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Off-Centred-disk Swastika flag

The mentioned discussion in FOTW is obsolete. There are recent publications (see source), which definitely prove that the only official German National flag after 1935 was the off-centered disk version. Flags with centered swastikas that were used after 1935 (and found in 1945 by the allies) all represented Party flags ! This led to some confusion after the war as to the correct position of the disk. The somewhat complicated matter is (correctly) illustrated here (including the intricate question of the reverse sides of the flags): [2] Also the German Wikipedia delivers the facts correctly: [3] Source: Andreas Herzfeld: Einige unbekannte Flaggenänderungen 1933-1945 in: Der Flaggenkurier Nr. 13/2001, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Flaggenkunde, S. 17 ff. --Gomeira (talk) 09:53, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I have also updated List of German flags. Cheers, Pædia 04:37, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Civil Ensign of the Weimar Republic

I'm surprized that this Featured Article makes no mention of the Civil Ensign used by Weimar Germany - ). I'm not a flag expert, but would have thought it merited a mention. Mjroots (talk) 19:29, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Since they were from different parts of Germany and were all wearing different coloured clothes, the only possibility for them, in order to have a uniform appearance, was to colour their clothes black.

This doesn't read idiomatically. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.39.6.83 (talk) 13:25, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Colors used in historic flags?

Under design the article list the current colors in use. What (specific) colors did the old flags have? How did the red change over the years?--78.48.41.250 (talk) 14:22, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Flag of Belgium

The similarity with the Flag of Belgium is not mentioned here, although the similarity is illustrated at that article. In fact, that article has an entire section on similar flags. Why is this not also the case here? Martinevans123 (talk) 13:10, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

"Similar flag" sections like this tend to be out of scope, unreferenced and original research. I've removed the one that was (briefly) in this article. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 13:54, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Bellicose Flag Psychometry

At psychometric tests, the German Flag is on the top of the list of the bellicose flags that do not depict animals or beasts. Please include psychometric tests. The article is not full. I do not harass the German flag. Wikipedia in general fails to include flag related psychometric results. The fact that data are not included doesn't mean that that there are no psychometric vexillological data — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.84.218.172 (talk) 09:09, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

German Empire flag (1866-1918) is not banned in Germany!

According to this source, it seems like black-white-red flag is legal in Germany.

[[4]]

Kaettekita T. Lavhey (talk) 12:48, 19 May 2017 (UTC)

Dreyhaupt (2000)

"conservatives, monarchists, and the far right", Monarchists, Conservatives ARE the far right. You probably meant to say National Socialist, which isn't even a rightist movement. --105.15.23.17 (talk) 19:08, 19 May 2017 (UTC)

I guess you would have to take it up with Dreyhaupt (2000), which is the source cited for this. Or request verification if this actually reflects the content of the source. In my understanding, "conservatives, monarchists, and the far right" in Weimar Germany are pretty much one single diffuse group, conservatives are monarchists, monarchists are far-rightists, and far-rightists are, as you say, conservatives.

You are right that in the German federal election, July 1932, the left-right ideological poles would have been marked by KPD and DNVP, with the victorious NSDAP not, by this measure, at the extreme end of the spectrum. But I don't really see this as implied in the statement as given in the article, which is pretty vague on who exactly it is talking about. --dab (𒁳) 13:48, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

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New flag for football fans?

It looks they have new flags with logo containing Bundesadler provided by Deutscher Fussbal-Bund Fan Club. See here. Gumruch (talk) 20:45, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

This caught my eye as well, but it certainly seems trivial even in the scope of flag variants or 1989–present. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:26, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Recent edit

Preserving here by providing this link. My rationale was: "these details are not sufficiently significant as to resort to Speer and Mein Kampf". --K.e.coffman (talk) 02:24, 27 November 2019 (UTC)

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There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Flag of the United States which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 22:46, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

WP:URFA/2020

This 2008 promotion looks like it needs some work to get up to the modern FA standards. There is a decent amount of uncited text sprinkled throughout the article, and a few of the web sources look weak - Flags of the World is dubious, and the Historical Flags of Our Ancestors source (aka loeser.us) doesn't look very reliable, either. This may need a featured article review. Hog Farm _Talk 07:34, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

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Austr-

Should Austrian-Prussian "Austrian-Prussian leadership" be changed to Austro-Prussian? Austro-Hungarian for example is more commonly said that Austrian-Hungarian. Alexeyperlov 18:31, 1 November 2024 (UTC)