FLAGS AND EMBLEMS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3380, 27 June 1927, Page 7

FLAGS AND EMBLEMS.

Many legends have grown up round armorial bearings, but according to Licut.-Colonel Whitton, who writes on “Flags and Emblems” in the “Nineteenth Century,” the most picturesque of them, the story that the Prince of Wales’ feathers, with the motto “Ich Dien,” were taken from the crest of the blind King of Bohemia, killed at Grecy, will not stand the test of research. The feathers were not the King’s crest. They seem to have come from the family of the prince’s mother. Phillipa of Hainault. Flags are very much older than armorial bearings. From early times they have been used to preserve organisation and discipline in battle and to inspire courage. In the armies of ancient Egypt each battalion, and even each company, had a standard representing a sacred subject —a king’s name, a sacred boat, or an animal signifying a god. The post of standard-bearer was one of great honour. The Assyrians seem to have had only two designs, one consisting of an archer standing on a galloping bull and the other of two bulls galloping in different directions. Both Assyrian and Egyptian warships carried emblems on sails. The Persians used their deity, the sun, as a battle emblem. Isaiah, who lived in a time of great wars, speaks of confusion and despair “as when a standard bearer fainteth.” The Greeks used their flags for signalling. The cities bore animal designs as emblems, the Athenians fighting under the sacred owl of Minerva. In the Roman army it was Marius who abolished “class distinctions” and gave to the legion as a whole the eagle. It was a small silver or bronze bird with extended wings. To lose the eagle was the supreme disgrace. Caesar’s standard bearer of the tenth legion, when his followers hesitated under the cliffs of Britain, plunged into the sea and carried the eagle toward the shore saying, “I at least will go in duty to Rome and Caesar.” Great ceremony attended the planting of the eagles when camp was pitched, and when the march was resumed it was an evil omen if the staff did not easily come free of the ground. From thetpime of Constantine Roman armies fought under the labarum, formed of the two first Greek letters of the word Christ. The individual knight and his personal emblem formed the rallying point of medieval armies, though religious banners played their parts in some great victories. Great generals, such as Napoleon and Frederick the Great, made the most of the sentiment toward the Colours. In the Crimea and the American Civil War they were regarded with the greatest devotion and enthusiasm. British colours have not been carried in battle since the Zulu war, when Lieutenants Melville and Coghill lost their lives trying to save the colours of the 24th Regiment. Common both to the British Army and the American is the practice of carrying two colours, one peculiarly identified with the regiment, the other symbolising its connection with the sovereign in the British army, and the nation in the American, The claim of any ship bearing the King’s flag to be saluted by any foreign vessel in the English Channel was stoutly maintained till Trafalgar, Phillip of Spain, coming to marry Mary, was fired on by the British Lord High Admiral for flying his own flag in the Channel. There were then three naval ensigns: white, which signified that the ship’s position was in the van; red, denoting station in the centre, and blue for ships in the rear of the fleet. Fleets became smaller as ironclads displaced wooden vessels. White became restricted to the navy and Royal Yacht Squadron under heavy penalties; the blue ensign is the flag of public service other than the navy, and the red ensign belongs to the merchant service.