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Republica de Nicaragua, Republic of Nicaragua
The Flag
The blue-white-blue pattern is common to all the central American states, being a reminder of the union from the beginning of the 19th century. Each of the five original countries found a way to differentiate the flag. Costa Rica put a red stripe in the middle, Nicaragua and El Salvador their coats of arms, Honduras five stars, and Guatemala turned the stripes vertically. All of the states (except Guatemala) have common elements on their coat of arms - mountains (volcanoes) with a sea on each side, secessionist cap, spectrum, stars, and the inscription 'America Central'. The triangle symbolizes equality. Civilians on the land may use, also, the flag without the arms.
Zeljko Heimer, 24 February 1996
From :
The National Flag: The white stripe stands for the territory of our nation and represents the purity of our fatherland. The two blue stripes mean our territory is bathed by two oceans.
translated by Santiago Dotor, 4 January 1999
According to [smi75], Honduras entry (page 241) "The blue-white-blue horizontal striped flag of the United Provinces of the Center of America, based on the Argentine flag, was first hoisted in the independence struggle against Spain on 4 July 1818, when the commodore of the Argentine squadron, Louis Aury, proclaimed the first independent Central American state on islands off the eastern coast of Nicaragua. Aury's government lasted until 1821... ...(in 1823) when complete independence was established the new national flag had stripes similar to, and apparently based on, those of the first free state.."
Ned Smith, 14 May 1999
At "Nouveau Petit Larousse Illustre" (1924) - Nicaragua: An emblem without circle of text, without rays, with a sea in the foreground and a thin black line around the triangle to distinguish it from the white background.
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 29 October 2000
I remember that Nicaragua used silver letters in place of gold for lesser government offices. Is this practice dropped?
Pier Paolo Lugli, 18 April 2001
I would rather say that escudo was reportedly written in black (cf note of Album 1990). Yet all photos received from Nicaragua (and also infos from vexillological sources) all showed escudo in full colour (and letters in gold); this is why I dropped the note of Album 1990.
Armand du Payrat, 18 April 2001
According to [pay00] - National Flag (CSW/CSW 3:5) - Blue-white-blue horizontal tricolour with the coat of arms in the middle. The coat of arms is that inherited from the Central-american union, five vulcanoes, two oceans, freedom hat, sun-rays, rainbow, all within a triangle and surrounded with the name of the state.
The ratio 3:5 is found in [smi75] [smi82] [vdv00] so also in [pay00] and probably in some other sources. However [neu92] has the images (this and next one) pictured as 1:2.
Flaggenbuch also explains how the lower governmnet offices display the flag with silver inscriptions. IIRC, the FOTW suggests that such notion is more a "vexillological mith" then anything else.
For the national flag above I used CoA from Corel Clipart. At that size the minor differences shell not be visible. However, the CoA is pictured in various sources in rather noticable (though probably unimportant, heraldically
irrelevant) differences.
Zeljko Heimer, 3 July 2002
The current version of the flag is adopted 27 August 1971 even if the flag is originally that of the United Provinces of Central America of 1821. In 1970 Evans [eva70] writes, after discussing first the flag of Honduras and then the flag of El Salvador:
"The national and merchant flag and ensign of Nicaragua also places the national arms at the centre of a flag striped horizontally, blue, white, blue, but the flag itself is considerably longer than those of either Honduras or El Salvador."
This is a bit curious as Honduras is 1:2 as well, but the important part would be to distinguish it from El Salvador which it closely resembles, especially as he pictures El Salvador and Nicaragua with a lighter shade of blue. And indeed, where he pictures El Slavadoe approximately 3:5, Nicaragua is pictured approximately 1:2 (and so is Honduras).
This would suggest the ratio of the flag changed when with that 1971 adoption.
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 6 July 2002
The Constitution of the Republic of Nicaragua, adopted on 19 November 1986 and published in La Gaceta, diario oficial of 9 January 1987, says:
"Title II
The State
Chapter I
Article 13. - The symbols of the nation are the National Anthem, the Flag and the Official Seal as established by law that determines their characteristics and use.
Sources: Spanish: Georgetown University's Political Data Base of the Americas,
Translation: P. Vagnat & J.Poels book on Constitutions and flags [vap00].
Ivan Sache, 19 March 2003
This flag was originally that of the United Provinces of Central America (independent 1821) from which Nicaragua succeeded in 1838. It was re-established by a Decree of 4 September 1908, and regulated by Chapter II, Article 2 of Decree No. 1908 dated 23 August 1971 (which laid down the ratio as 3:5 and defined the colour as 'cobalt blue'). A plain triband without arms is in widespread use, it is officially tolerated but has not been formally sanctioned by law.
The arms, originally adopted on 21 August 1823, are those of the former United Provinces of Central America.
Christopher Southworth, 23 March 2003
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