Flag of the Basque Country

Irishina
	; ;
Vexillological symbol :	?
Aspect ratio:	14:25
Officially accepted:	15th January 1979

The flag of the Basque Country ( Ikurrina [ ikuriɲa ] or Ikurriña to German : flag ) was officially approved by the 1979 Basque Country adopted. The icurrina is also part of the flag of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon and symbolizes the Basque immigrants there.

Description and meaning

The red background comes from the coat of arms and the old flag of the Basque province of Bizkaia ( Vizcaya ) and stands for the Basque Country. The green of the St. Andrew's Cross stands for independence and comes from the oak of Gernika , which is also a symbol of freedom of the Basques. Andrew's crosses have a long tradition in Basque flags. Allegedly this comes from a battle at Arrigorriaga on St. Andrew's day in 867, in which the princes of Bizkaia and Durango and the king of Léon met . The white cross symbolizes God. White cross and Gernika oak can also be found on the coat of arms of Bizkaia.

If a flag has the external dimensions of 500 × 280 cm, the crosses have a width of 43 cm.

history

Irishina

For the most part, what is now the autonomous Basque Country was part of the Kingdom of Navarre and used its flag . Between 1000 and 1035, Sancho III. the great one extended his empire to large parts of north-east Spain . Its flag, the Arrano Beltza ( Basque for black eagle), is still preferred today by Basque nationalists to the irishina as a symbol for all of Baskia.

Originally designed as the flag of Bizkaia by the brothers Luis and Sabino Arana Goiri in 1894, the icurrina was first publicly displayed in Bilbao on July 14 . Some sources state that the flag was designed only by Luis, while his brother Sabino created flags for the other Basque provinces. But when the irishina became the flag of all Basques and the other designs were not implemented, Sabino is even said to have temporarily left the Basque National Party . The Ikkurina spread in the 20th century in Gipuzkoa , Álava and Navarra , as well as in the French Basque Country .

During the Second Spanish Republic , the government of the autonomous Basque Country first declared the irishina the official flag by decree of October 19, 1936. With the decree of October 24, 1936, the width of the stripes of the standard flag was increased from 20 cm to 43 cm in order to make the green cross more visible. During the Spanish dictatorship, the flag was banned as a secessionist symbol. It was not officially reintroduced until 1979 in accordance with the autonomous status of the Basque Country.