TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
Bold text is denoted by =equal signs=.
Superscripts are denoted by ^ and have not been expanded;
for example 'I am informed y^t the Ma^{rs} of'.
Obvious typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected
after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and
consultation of external sources.
More detail can be found at the end of the book.
CAMBRIDGE NAVAL AND MILITARY SERIES
GENERAL EDITORS
SIR JULIAN S. CORBETT, LL.M., F.S.A.
H. J. EDWARDS, C.B., C.B.E., M.A.
BRITISH FLAGS
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
C. F. CLAY, MANAGER
LONDON: FETTER LANE, E.C. 4
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO.
BOMBAY }
CALCUTTA } MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.
MADRAS }
TORONTO: THE MACMILLAN CO. OF
CANADA, LTD.
TOKYO: MARUZEN-KABUSHIKI-KAISHA
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
[Illustration: _A Ship of Henry VIII, circa 1545_]
BRITISH FLAGS
THEIR EARLY HISTORY, AND THEIR DEVELOPMENT
AT SEA; WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN OF
THE FLAG AS A NATIONAL DEVICE
BY
W. G. PERRIN
ADMIRALTY LIBRARIAN
SECRETARY OF THE NAVY RECORDS SOCIETY
FELLOW OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY
ILLUSTRATED IN COLOUR
BY
HERBERT S. VAUGHAN
CHEVALIER OF THE LEGION
OF HONOUR
CAMBRIDGE
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
1922
PREFACE
It might have been expected that the attempt to trace to their origin
in the past the institutions and customs in common use upon the sea
would from an early date occupy the attention of a seafaring people,
but for some obscure reason the British nation has always been
indifferent to the history of its activities upon that element on which
its greatness was founded, and to which it has become more and more
dependent for its daily bread and its very existence. To those who
are alive to this fact it will hardly come as a surprise, therefore,
to learn that the first sustained attempt at a detailed investigation
into the history of the flag at sea was made under the patronage
of the German Admiralty by a German Admiral. Vice-Admiral Siegel's
_Die Flagge_, published in 1912, was the first book to deal with the
development of the flag at sea in a scientific spirit, and although
the earlier chapters contain some mistakes due to his employment of
translations of early works instead of original texts, and the accounts
of the British flags in the later chapters suffer because he had no
access to original records, it is a worthy piece of work.
The present book is an attempt to remove the reproach to the British
nation which this implies. Its plan is somewhat different from that
of the work referred to above. Instead of dealing with the flags of
all maritime nations of the world--a task that (if it was to be more
than a mere copying or compilation) would entail much work in foreign
archives--it seemed more profitable to concentrate upon the history
of British Naval Flags, for researches made so far back as 1908 had
taught me how much that is inaccurate about their history had received
acceptance. But first it seemed necessary to devote some time and
space to the inquiry into the origin of the flag and how it became the
honoured symbol of nationality that it now is, and for this a general
view had to be taken in order that a firm foundation might be laid for
the early history of our own flags.
In the first chapter the ground worked over by Admiral Siegel has been
solidified by examination of the original authorities, with the result
that a few errors have been detected and some new facts brought to
light, and the investigation has also been extended further; the most
important of the additions being those relating to the standards in
the Phoenician and Greek ships of war, forms of the early "standard"
and "gonfanon," and the Genoese Standard of St George and the Dragon.
For the deduction that the use of a national flag arose in the Italian
city states I take the entire responsibility, well aware that further
investigations may possibly bring to light fresh facts which will
overthrow it.
The chapter on early English, Scottish and Irish flags serves as an
introduction to the history of our national flag, which was invented
for the use of the mercantile marine, though it was very soon
appropriated by the Royal Navy for its sole use. It is very improbable
that further research will enable the gap left by the unfortunate
destruction of the early 17th century records to be filled, so that the
story of the Union Flag may be taken as being substantially complete,
but there is still room for further work upon the history of its
component crosses. It will be seen that I have been unable to find any
solid ground for the common belief that the cross of St George was
introduced as the national emblem of England by Richard I, and am of
opinion that it did not begin to attain that position until the first
years of the reign of Edward I.
The chapters on the flags used to indicate distinctions of command and
service at sea give an account of the use (now obsolete) of the Royal
Standard at sea by naval commanders-in-chief; of the history of the
Admiralty anchor-flag; and of the steps by which the present Admirals'
flags were evolved. The history of the ensigns from their first
adoption at sea about the end of Elizabeth's reign has been set out in
some detail, but further research may bring to light more details of
interest in the years between 1574 and 1653. The causes which led to
the adoption of a red ensign as the most important British ensign and
the steps which led to its appropriation to the Mercantile Marine, and
not the Royal Navy, are stated as far as the records availed, though
here again further research is needed in the late Elizabethan and
early Stuart periods among records that may still survive in private
ownership. These chapters may, perhaps, appeal rather to the seaman
and the student of naval history than to the general reader, but it is
hoped that they may also prove of service to artists who wish to avoid
the anachronisms into which some of their brethren have been betrayed.
In order that the development of flag signals may be properly
appreciated it has been necessary, when dealing with the earlier years,
to take into account what had happened outside the narrow circuit of
British waters. The earlier matter, though here examined solely from
the point of view of the flags used, offers considerable interest to
the student of naval tactics, with which indeed the art of signalling
is inseparably connected.
The last chapter, on Ceremonial and other usages, is, from the author's
point of view, the least satisfactory. From the nature of the subject,
the official records contain very little information about it. It
is only by the slow and laborious process of examining contemporary
journals, diaries, accounts of voyages, and similar material that facts
can be found for any exhaustive treatment of these matters. Something
of this has been done, but more remains to do.
In concluding the work which has occupied a large portion of the
leisure hours of many years, it is my pleasant duty to express my
gratitude to the numerous friends whose encouragement and assistance
have enabled me to persevere in what has proved a somewhat arduous
task; especially to Sir Julian Corbett, who has read the proofs and
given me the benefit of his criticisms; to the officials of the
Pepysian Library, Public Record Office, British Museum and London
Library for the facilities afforded me; and not least to my friend Mr
Vaughan who has spared no pains in the preparation of the coloured
plates.
W. G. PERRIN.
_January 1922_
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE ORIGIN OF THE FLAG AND ITS DEVELOPMENT
UP TO THE END OF THE THIRTEENTH
CENTURY 1
II. EARLY ENGLISH, SCOTTISH AND IRISH FLAGS
(i) ENGLAND 30
(ii) SCOTLAND 46
(iii) IRELAND 50
III. THE UNION FLAGS AND JACKS 54
IV. FLAGS OF COMMAND
(i) THE ROYAL STANDARD 74
(ii) THE ADMIRALTY FLAG 81
(iii) ADMIRALS' FLAGS 85
(iv) PENDANTS OF COMMAND 102
V. COLOURS OF DISTINCTION
(i) PUBLIC SHIPS OF WAR 110
(ii) PRIVATE MEN-OF-WAR 124
(iii) PUBLIC SHIPS FOR USES OTHER THAN WAR 126
(iv) MERCHANT SHIPS 129
(v) PLEASURE CRAFT 136
VI. FLAG SIGNALS
(i) EARLY SIGNALS 140
(ii) THE FIRST ENGLISH CODES 161
(iii) THE INVENTION OF NUMERARY SIGNALS 166
(iv) THE VOCABULARY SIGNAL BOOK 175
(v) COMMERCIAL CODES 183
VII. CEREMONIAL AND OTHER USAGES 189
INDEX 205
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
A SHIP OF HENRY VIII FRONTISPIECE
(From a MS. plan of Calais in the British Museum, _c._ 1545)
PLATE PAGE
I. EARLY FLAGS FACING 2
1. Vexillum
2. Harold's Dragon
3. William's Gonfanon
4. Knights Templars' Bauçan
5. Knights Hospitallers
6. St Edward
7. St Edmund
8. St George
9. St Andrew
10. Irish Saltire
11. Baucan
12. Holy Trinity
13. Cinque Ports
14. Yarmouth
II. COINS FACING 6
1. Sidon, _c._ 370 B.C.
2. " _c._ 380 B.C.
3. " _c._ 360 B.C.
4. " _c._ 90 B.C.
5. " _c._ 400 B.C.
6. Aradus, _c._ 350 B.C.
7 and 8. Histiaea, _c._ 300 B.C.
9. Rome (Hadrian)
10. Northumbria, _c._ 925 A.D.
11. Northumbria, _c._ 940 A.D.
III. SEALS FACING 46
1. Lyme Regis, 13th cent.
2. Yarmouth, 15th cent.
3. Dover, 1305
4. Sandwich, 13th cent.
5. Faversham, 13th cent.
6. Hastings, 13th cent.
7. Tenterden, 15th cent.
8. King's Lynn, late 16th cent.
IV. UNION FLAG FACING 54
1. Union of 1606 and 1707
2. Union of 1801
V. UNION FLAGS AND JACKS FACING 58
1. Quartered Union
2. Union Pendant
3. Commonwealth Jack
4. Protectorate Jack
5. Budgee Jack
6. Privateer Jack
7. Public Office Jack
8. Admiralty Pattern (modern)
VI. ROYAL STANDARDS FACING 74
1. Royal Standard, early
2. " " 1340
3. " " 1411
4. " " Stuart
5. Commonwealth Standard
6. Cromwell's Standard
7. Royal Standard, 1689
8. " " 1707
VII. ROYAL STANDARDS FACING 76
1. Royal Standard, 1714
2. " " 1801
3. " " 1837
VIII. ADMIRALS' FLAGS FACING 84
1. Admiralty Flag
2. Distinction Pendant
3. Commonwealth Admiral
4. Rear Admiral of Blue, 1702
5. Rear Admiral of White, 1702
6. Budgee Pendant
7. Rear Admiral of White, 1824
8. Vice Admiral, 1889
9. Rear Admiral, 1889
10. Broad Pendant (modern)
IX. EARLY ENSIGNS, ETC. FACING 92
1. Levant Co., 1581
2. Streamer of Royal Arms
3, 4, and 5. Elizabethan Ensigns
6. Jacobean Ensign
7. Green and White Pendant
8. Jacobean Ensign, 1615
9. Jacobean Ensign, 1618
10. Red Ensign, early 17th cent.
11. White Ensign, early 17th cent.
12. Blue Ensign, early 17th cent.
X. ENSIGNS, ETC. FACING 98
1. Scots Ensign, 1686
2. White Pendant
3. Irish Ensign, 1686
4. Scottish East India Co.
5. Guinea Jack
6. White Ensign, 1702
7. Red Ensign, 1707
8. White Ensign, 1707
9. Blue Ensign, 1707
10. White (St George) Ensign, 1707
11. East India Co., 1822
XI. MODERN ENSIGNS, ETC. FACING 118
1. White Ensign, 1801
2. Blue Ensign, 1801
3. Red Ensign, 1801
4. Admiralty, Blue Ensign
5. Naval Ordnance, Blue Ensign
6. Blue Pendant
7. War Office Badge
8. Military Auth. Afloat
9. Post Office
10. Royal Mail
11. North Sea Fishery
XII. MODERN ENSIGNS, ETC. FACING 134
1. New Zealand Ensign, 1831
2. New Zealand Blue Ensign
3. Australian Blue Ensign
4. Trinity House
5. Cinque Ports
6. Red Pendant
7. Canada Badge
8. South Africa Badge
9. Indian Marine Badge
10. Lloyds Badge
XIII. NUMERARY SIGNAL FLAGS (1790-1810) FACING 170
Chapter I
_The Origin of the Flag and its Development up to the end of the
Thirteenth Century_
A flag may be defined as a piece of pliable material, attached at
one end so as to move freely in the wind, serving as a sign or a
decoration. This word is now common to the nations of north-western
Europe[1], but it does not appear to have come into use in this
particular meaning until the sixteenth century, and the etymology of it
is obscure. Perhaps the most satisfactory of the derivations hitherto
put forward is that of Professor Skeat, who derives it from the Middle
English "flakken" to fly, one of a number of similar onomatopoeic
words suggestive of the sound of something flapping in the wind. Its
first appearance with a meaning coming within the above definition is
as a specific term denoting a rectangular piece of material attached
by one vertical edge, flown at the masthead of a ship, as a symbol of
nationality or leadership. It was not until towards the end of the
seventeenth century that the word began to take on the more general
meaning it now has, and indeed the restricted meaning still partially
survives in the German language, in which the word "Flagge" is properly
applicable only to flags flown at sea, those on land being called
"Fahnen." Before the seventeenth century there was no generic term in
the English language that covered the various forms--banners, ensigns,
streamers, pendants, etc.--that are now generally included under the
term "flag."
A somewhat similar change in meaning has, during the course of
centuries, affected nearly every flag name, and constitutes one of
the great difficulties in the way of a clear exposition of the early
history of flags. Moreover, the early writers are neither consistent
in their use of terms nor accurate in their application. This renders
the correct interpretation of many passages a matter requiring
caution and discrimination and, it may be added, experience. As a
guide to the reader we shall set down the principal terms to be met
with, and indicate the extent to which their meaning has changed, but
before doing so it is desirable to explain one or two technical or
semi-technical terms employed in connection with the parts of a flag.
The part next the staff or line to which it is attached is called the
"hoist" by seamen, or heraldically the head or "chief"; the remainder
of the flag is the "fly." The fly may be forked or swallow-tailed.
If the end of the fly is divided by a simple incision which does not
remove material, it is said to be "slit." The fly may be produced into
a number of pointed or round-ended tails, to which the Crusaders gave
the name of tongues (_linguae_, _lingulae_). The British and many other
ensigns have in the upper part next the staff a rectangular compartment
containing a national device. In modern flags this usually occupies
one-fourth of the flag, but in early flags it was much smaller. This is
called a "canton." The other terms that need explanation at this stage
are as follows:
Σημεῖον [Greek: Sêmeion] (Semeion). This word appears to have been
first used in the abstract meaning of "sign" or "signal"; to have been
then applied to the object by which the signal was made, or which
signalised the presence of the commanding officer. In the early period
of Greece this was not a flag, but a staff-like object.
=Insigne=, pl. =Insignia=. The Latin equivalent of the above, denoting
a sign, signal, or staff of office.
=Signum.= A token or sign, especially the distinctive sign of a
division of the Roman army. Also used to denote "signal" in the
abstract.
=Vexillum.= A square flag hung from a transverse bar at the head of a
staff; the principal form of flag in use in the classical period. In
late writers this word is used to cover any form of flag, and from the
eighth century onwards will be found applied as well to objects that
were not flags, for which the word _insigne_ should have been used.
=Banner= (late Latin _bandum_, _bannum_). A rectangular flag attached
laterally to its staff. Originally of much greater depth than length,
a "band" of coloured material attached to a lance by one of its
longer sides, it gradually became square. The banner was primarily
the personal flag of an emperor, king, lord or knight, and served to
mark his presence in the army or fleet, and as a rallying point for
his retainers. On the introduction of heraldic devices these were
inserted upon it. It was also employed by religious or civic bodies for
a similar purpose. In modern language this term is usually applied to
flags hung from transverse bars, displayed in religious or political
processions, but we shall not employ it in this meaning.
[Illustration: PLATE I Early Flags]
=Gonfanon=, =Gonfalon=. This word appears in the _Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle_ as _guðfana_, and in the _Chanson de Roland_ as _gunfanun_.
It is apparently derived from the Norse _gunn-fane_ (war-flag) and in
its earlier forms was probably of the shape shown on the Northumbrian
coins about 925 A.D.[2] Among the Normans two centuries later it had a
square body and ended in three or more long tails, a form handed on
to the Italian Communes. Some writers apply this name (inaccurately) to
flags of vexillum form, with or without tails at the base.
=Standard.= This word presents great difficulty, and it has undergone a
radical change in meaning which (so far as I am aware) has never been
explained. As no historical survey of the development of the flag can
fairly ignore the need for such an explanation it will be necessary
to treat it at some length. At different periods in history since the
eleventh century the word under one or more of its many forms (e.g.
estandart, standart, standardum, standarz, standarum, standalem), has
had the following meanings:
(i) A tall pole or staff supporting some object that was not a flag.
(ii) A tall pole or mast set in a four-wheeled chariot, supporting
various objects, including one or more flags.
(iii) An elongated tapering flag containing the arms or badges of a
king or noble.
(iv) A rectangular banner containing the royal arms.
One of the earliest appearances of the word is in the _Chanson de
Roland_. The oldest existing MS. of this poem was, it is true, not
written before the latter part of the twelfth century, but it is well
known that the poem itself is much older. In this long poem of some
4000 lines the word occurs thrice only, and is confined to the episode
which relates to Baligant, Emir of Babylon, which M. Gaston Paris
considers to be the work of another author. The passages in question
are:
3265. Li amiralz mult par est riches hum
Dedavant lui fait porter sun dragun
E l'estandart Tervagan e Mahum.
[The Emir is a very great man
Before him he has carried his dragon
And the standard of Tervagan and Mahomet.]
3329. Carles li magnes, cum il vit l'amiraill
E le dragun, l'enseigne, e l'estandart,
[Charlemagne, when he saw the emir
And the dragon, the flag and the standard,]
3551. Baliganz veit sun gunfanun cadeir
E l'estandart Mahumet remaneir.
[Baligant sees his gonfanon fall
And the standard of Mahomet remain (defenceless).]
In speaking of the flags the poet (or perhaps poets) uses either the
words "enseigne" or "gunfanun" or, in one instance, "orie flambe." What
then was the "Standard of Mahomet" which the author of this section
has in mind? The story he is telling is, of course, purely mythical,
so that he, or the original inventor of the myth, must have met the
word and the object which it connoted in some other connection. The
most likely source of this knowledge is the First Crusade. During the
struggle for the possession of Jerusalem in the summer of 1099, Robert
of Normandy, in personal combat, seized from one of the Saracen Emirs
an object which is described as a very long pole covered over with
silver, having at its top a golden ball or apple (_pomum aureum_).
This was called a standard, a word which was evidently at that time
of recent introduction, for the contemporary historians, some of whom
had been eye-witnesses of the events they relate, have various ways
of spelling it, and usually refer to it in such a way as to indicate
that the word was not in familiar use[3]. According to Albert of Aix[4]
this standard was borne in front of the army of the "King of Babylon"
and was the centre around which the flower of the army gathered and to
which stragglers returned. A few years later Fulcher of Chartres notes
the capture of three more "standards," but does not describe them.
The second form of standard (which was apparently imitated from the
Italian _carrocio_ presently to be described) makes its appearance
nearly a hundred years later. In an engagement with the Saracens near
Acre at the end of August, 1191, the banner of Richard I was borne
aloft on a machine of which the unknown but contemporary author of the
_Itinerarium Regis Ricardi_ gives the following description:
The Normans formed a rampart around the Standard, which in order
that it may be better known we have not thought it out of the way
to describe. It consists, then, of a very long beam, like the
mast of a ship, placed upon four wheels in a frame very solidly
fastened together and bound with iron, so that it seems incapable
of yielding either to sword, axe or fire. Affixed to the very top
of this, the royal flag, commonly called banner, flies in the wind.
For the protection of this machine, especially in battle in the
open, a selected band of soldiers is appointed, so that it may not
be broken down by onrush of the enemy or overthrown by any injury,
for if by any chance it should be overthrown the army would be
dispersed and confounded, because it would not know in what part of
the field to rally. Moreover, the hearts of the soldiers would be
filled with the fear that their leader had been overcome if they
did not see his banner borne aloft. Nor would they in the rear
readily come forward to resist the enemy if, from the withdrawal of
his banner, they feared that some ill fortune had happened to their
king. But while that standard remained erect the people had a sure
place of refuge. Hither the sick were brought to be cured, hither
were brought the wounded, and even famous or illustrious men tired
out in the fighting. Whence, because it stands fast as a sign to
all the people, it is called the "Standard."[5] It is placed upon
four wheels, not without reason, in order that, according to the
state of the battle, it may be either brought forward as the enemy
yield or drawn back as they press on.
It is to a machine similar to this, and bearing aloft a pyx and three
banners, that the battle near Northallerton in 1138 owes its name of
Battle of the Standard.
The use of this form of standard was not confined to the English;
indeed it seems to have been in general use in the armies of western
Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and the transference
of the name from the support to the royal, ducal, or state flag that
it bore was a natural consequence. This transference evidently began
to take place about the end of the thirteenth century, for in 1282 the
State gonfanon of Genoa, hitherto called the "vexillum" of St George,
in the _Annales Genoenses_, becomes the "Stantarium B. Georgii." In
England the change seems to have taken place a little later. I have not
met with it before the year 1323, when the Exchequer Accounts contain
references to Standards (Estandartz, estandardes) bearing the royal
arms and made of worsted of Aylesham.
But the name was not given in England to every form of flag bearing
the royal arms or cross of St George. It was confined to a particular
type intermediate in length between the streamer and the banner[6].
This type was evidently the direct descendant of the "gonfanon," which
is the only form of flag represented on such of the great seals of our
early kings as show flags at all[7]. From the fact that it is this
form which is depicted at the masthead of the ships in early seals,
as for instance those of Hastings and Lyme Regis (thirteenth century)
and of Dover (1305) reproduced in Plate III, we may infer that it was
the type most convenient for use at the head of the "standard," and
therefore the type to which the name gradually became applied. During
the fourteenth century the tails were reduced in number to two and
the flag made to taper gradually throughout its length. Finally, the
heralds established a form in which the tails were short, blunt and
rounded off at the end, which they decided should contain the cross of
St George in chief with the motto and badges of the owner, but not his
arms, in the fly. This change seems to have taken place about the end
of the fifteenth century. By the restriction of the royal arms to flags
of banner form the name "standard," when qualified by the adjective
"royal" (but only in this connection), became transferred to the royal
banner of arms, not only in popular speech which makes no account of
such technical niceties, but also in official usage from Tudor times to
this day.
=Streamer.= A long and relatively narrow flag flown at sea from the
masthead, top or yardarm, often reaching down to the water. The
earlier name of the modern "pendant." The term is also applied to any
ribbon-like flag or decoration.
=Pennon.= Originally a small pointed flag worn at the lance-head by
knights; but the word was used at sea in the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries to denote a short streamer.
=Pennoncel.= A small pennon.
=Pennant= (in modern official language written "pendant," but
pronounced "pennant"). A synonym for "streamer," a name which it has
gradually replaced.
=Geton=, =gytton=, =guidon=. A small swallow-tailed flag.
=Ensign= (corruptly written "ancient" during the sixteenth to
eighteenth centuries). This word was borrowed from the land service
in the sixteenth century to denote the striped flag then introduced
on the poop of ships. In explaining the meaning of this word in the
Army, Barret[8] remarks: "We Englishmen do call them (Ensigns) of late
Colours, by reason of the variety of colours they be made of, whereby
they be the better noted and known to the companie."
=Colours.= Originally applied to an ensign; afterwards extended to
mean the flags commonly flown by a ship. At the end of the seventeenth
century a "suit of colours" included ensign, jack and pendant.
=Jack.= A small flag flown on the bowsprit.
Upon the water, as upon the land, the Standard (taking the word in its
earliest meaning) seems to have preceded the Flag by many centuries.
The earliest knowledge we have of its existence is derived from the
pottery of the pre-dynastic Egyptians, to whom, on the most moderate
estimate of Egyptologists, a date not later than 4000 B.C. has been
assigned. Among the primitive decorations of the earthenware vases
and boxes of that period the representation of a boat[9] frequently
appears. In these boats, which seem to have been in use only on the
Nile, the two cabins amidships are a prominent feature. At the end
of the aftermost cabin rises a tall pole with an emblem at the top,
which is believed to represent the district or town to which the owner
of the boat belonged. There are at least eighteen different forms
of this emblem[10], but these standards all agree in having in their
upper part two pendent objects which appear to be long ribbons or
streamers attached to the pole. These standards were developed into
the nome-standards of the Egyptian armies, but they never again appear
in Egypt in connection with boats, which from the time of the First
Dynasty onwards are invariably represented without standard or flag of
any kind, although in rare instances the top of the steering oar is
decorated with two long ribbons.
[Illustration: PLATE II Coins]
Standards appear to have been in use at a later date among all the
Semitic nations, but evidence of their use upon the sea before the
fifth century B.C. is not forthcoming. From about the end of that
century onwards Sidon and Aradus (Arvad), the two great seaports of
Phoenicia, referred to by the prophet Ezekiel in his lamentation for
Tyre[11] as supplying the mariners for that city, placed upon their
coinage[12] a representation of a war galley. At the stern of this
galley, supported against a curved ornament similar to that to which
the Greeks gave the name "Aphlaston," is placed a tall staff having at
its top a globe within the arms of a crescent, representing the sun and
moon. In the earlier examples this is too indistinct for successful
photographic representation but it is clearly visible in the coins of
the fourth century shown in Plate II[13].
After the submission of those cities to Alexander the Great in 333 B.C.
the globe and crescent seems to have been exchanged for a cruciform
standard similar to that shown in the left hand of the goddess Astarte
in the coin of 87 B.C. depicted in Plate II, fig. 4. This cruciform
standard was probably adopted by Alexander from the Athenians, the
most prominent naval power of Greece, among whom it seems to have been
an object of great significance[14]. On two great amphorae awarded
to the victors in the Panathenaic games of 336-5 B.C., now in the
British Museum, it is represented in a manner which can leave no doubt
as to its symbolic importance. On one of them Athene holds in her
hand a long cruciform staff, the head of which is expanded in ovoid
form. On the other amphora the goddess has by her side a short column
which is surmounted by a winged Victory (Nike) holding in her left
hand a similar standard, and in her right the aphlaston of a galley.
Unfortunately for our purpose, the Athenians did not represent ships
upon their coinage, but similar standards are seen in the hand of the
nymph Histiaea upon the coins of the Euboean town of that name, dated
circa 313-265 B.C., two of which are represented in Plate II, figs.
7 and 8. Many other instances, too numerous to detail, will be found
upon later Greek coins. In these the crosses are not all of the same
design, and Prof. Babelon has collected examples of thirty-six forms,
all more or less different, from the plain cross to a more elaborate
form in which the head terminates in a ball and two small winged
figures of Victory kneel at the ends of the arms. Some of these forms
are decorated with narrow streamers; in many of them the cross-piece is
not at right angles to the staff, but it is possible that this may be
due to an attempt at perspective. One other instance deserves mention:
the excavations on the site of the important city of Pergamum in Asia
Minor, once the capital of the kingdom of Pergamus, and afterwards that
of the Roman province of Asia, have brought to light the bas-reliefs
which decorated the balustrade of the Portico of Athene Polias. On
this bas-relief, which, in the opinion of M. Collignon[15], alludes to
naval victories under Attalus (241-197 B.C.) or Eumenes II (197-159),
the cruciform standard is twice represented in highly ornate forms
terminating in pine cones at the head; in each case it is accompanied
with the aphlasta and beaks of galleys.
A careful study of all the examples leads to the conclusion that this
globe and crescent, or cruciform, standard was the symbol of naval
authority, the prototype in fact of the Admiral's flag. The name of
this standard is not specifically stated, but there can be no doubt
that it is the _semeion_ (σημεῖον [Greek: sêmeion]) frequently referred
to by Greek authors in describing naval actions. That the _semeion_
was a solid object we know from the fact that it was raised aloft in
giving signals[16]. There is evidence that _semeia_ were of various
forms and that these forms were distinctive of the nationality of the
ship. Of Artemisia, queen of Halicarnassus, who accompanied Xerxes in
his expedition against Greece and fought on the Persian side at the
Battle of Salamis (480 B.C.), Polyaenus, in his _Strategemata_, relates
that she had two _semeia_, one of "barbarian" form, the other Greek.
When she was pursuing a Greek ship she raised aloft the barbarian
standard[17], but when fleeing before a Greek ship she raised the
Greek standard, so that her pursuer took her ship for Greek and kept
off from it. The "barbarian" standard used by Artemisia was probably
the globe and crescent above referred to, for Sidon supplied Xerxes
with the best of his ships, and it was in Sidonian ships that Xerxes
himself was wont to embark[18]. It seems, on the other hand, probable
that a cruciform standard was in common use by all the Greek states
at an early period, for Polyaenus relates that Chabrias, the Athenian
general, just before his action off Naxos in 376 with the Lacedaemonian
fleet under Pollis, ordered his subordinate commanders to remove the
_semeia_ from their ships and to keep in mind, in the ensuing conflict,
that all ships bearing such signs were enemies[19].
The flag was evidently unknown to the early Greeks; it is never
mentioned by Homer, and indeed there is no equivalent word in the
language of the classical period, yet at the time when we first meet
with the standard on the Phoenician coins flags were in common use
by the Chinese. The Chinese classics on the art of war known as the
Sun Tzu and Wu Tzu, written in the fifth century B.C., make frequent
reference to them. They played a very important part in marshalling the
army and inspiriting the soldiers, and the correct moment to strike the
enemy was judged by the disorder of their flags. According to Wu, the
Chinese flags contained various animal emblems.
The origin of the flag in European waters may however be dated from
the end of the fifth century B.C., when a primitive form was, if later
writers[20] are a safe guide, in use in the Athenian navy. This was
the "purple garment" or "Phoinikis[21]," used as a signal for combat
or as the sign of the Admiral's ship. Possibly the use of this emblem
may have been imitated from the Phoenicians. It may, on the other
hand, have originated independently, from a necessity of rendering
the cruciform standard more conspicuous in action. There is not
sufficient evidence to decide this point, but it is significant that
the _vexillum_ in use among the Romans at a somewhat later date shows
traces of a similar origin.
The military standard or _signum_ of the Romans consisted of a lance
with silver-plated shaft with a cross-piece at the top, from which
in some instances a small vexillum was suspended. From the ends of
this cross-piece, whether it held a vexillum or not, hung ribbons with
silver ivy leaves at the ends. Below were a number of discs, which
are believed to represent the honours conferred upon the Legion to
which the _signum_ belonged[22]. Below these again was a crescent, as
a charm against ill-fortune. In the _signa_ of the Praetorian guard
the discs were replaced by crowns alternating with medallion portraits
of the imperial house. These _signa_ were used as company ensigns to
facilitate the tactical movements of the Legion. The principal standard
of the Legion, answering to the Regimental Colours, was the _aquila_ or
eagle. Pliny the Elder[23] informs us that
Caius Marius in his second consulship (B.C. 103) assigned the eagle
exclusively to the Roman Legions. Before that period it had only
held the first rank, there being four others as well, the wolf, the
minotaur, the horse and the wild boar, each of which preceded a
single division. Some few years before his time it had begun to be
the custom to carry the eagle only into battle, the other standards
being left behind in camp. Marius however abolished the rest of
them entirely.
The _vexillum_ consisted of a square piece of material, usually red or
purple but sometimes white or blue, hung by the top edge (or sometimes
its two top corners only) from a cross-piece at the head of a lance
and heavily fringed along its bottom edge. The peculiar method of
attachment at the corners, which caused it to hang in heavy folds
instead of straight down, would seem to indicate an origin similar
to that of the Greek "Phoinikis." This was the standard appropriated
to the cavalry and to the special detachments of infantry, and it is
said to be the oldest of the Roman military standards. It hung before
the General's tent and was used in giving the signal to prepare for
battle[24]. From its use in this connection it naturally became the
sign of a commander of a fleet of ships[25] and was used in giving the
signal for fleet actions.
Flavius Vegetius[26], writing at the close of the fourth century A.D.,
distinguishes six kinds of military insignia, viz.: aquila, draco,
vexillum, flammula, tufa and pinna. The _Draco_ or dragon had been
borrowed from the Parthians after the death of Trajan. It took the
form of a dragon fixed upon a lance with gaping jaws of silver. The
body was of coloured silk, and when the wind blew down the open jaws
the body was inflated. The _Flammula_ (little flame) was an elongated
flag attached to the staff at the side, split throughout its length so
as to form two narrow streamers. The _Tufa_ seems, from the name, to
have been some form of tuft[27] or helmet-crest, but the exact form is
not known. It is of interest as having been adopted in Britain under
the name _Tuuf_[28]. _Pinnae_ was the name given to the side wings
of the soldiers' helmets, apparently formed of feathers. The precise
form of the _pinna_ standard is not known, but it is probable that the
fan-shaped feather standards which are displayed at the coronation of
the pope are a survival of this, or the preceding form.
Until the end of the Roman Empire the standard was used at sea only
for signalling purposes or to mark the ship in which the leader was
embarked. Thus in the action off Marseilles in B.C. 49, in which
Caesar's fleet under the command of Brutus engaged the Massilian fleet
which was fighting on the side of Pompey, the ship in which Brutus was
embarked was quickly recognised by the leader's standard, and narrowly
escaped being rammed by two triremes from opposite sides[29].
There are frequent references to this standard in classical writers and
it is often depicted in reliefs or on coins. From these it is clear
that its position was on the starboard quarter of the ship, at the
leader's right hand; it was raised there in going into action, and its
removal was a sign of disaster or retreat. It would seem that it was
also removed if the fleet was about to be engaged by superior forces,
presumably in order that the enemy might not concentrate against the
leader's ship. Thus in B.C. 36 Octavian, when expecting an attack at
sea by Pompey, embarked in a liburnian and sailed round the fleet
exhorting his men to have courage. When he had done this he lowered his
standard "as is the custom in times of very great danger[30]."
Pompey, whose success at sea had already induced him to exchange the
customary purple cloak of the Roman commander for a dark blue one, "as
the adopted son of Neptune," inflicted on Octavian the defeat that the
latter had anticipated, but was shortly afterwards himself defeated
at Naulochus by Agrippa, whom Octavian, a few years later, after the
battle of Actium, honoured with a special dark blue flag[31] as a
symbol of his naval superiority. From the account given by Appian of
the action off Naulochus it is clear that there was no distinguishing
flag in the private ships, as he expressly states that the only
difference in the ships of Octavian and Pompey lay in the colours of
the towers erected on them. From another passage in Appian[32] it
appears that it was the rule for the inferior commander to lower his
standard on approaching a superior. It is evident that these standards
were not "national" in the sense that our modern flags are national.
It is difficult to understand why an invention so apparently simple
as the laterally-attached flag should have been so late in making
its appearance in Europe (except in the form of small ribbon-like
streamers), but the fact remains that it is not until the close of the
eighth century A.D. that we meet with evidence of its existence. About
the year 800 Pope Leo III caused a mosaic to be placed on the apse of
the Triclinium of the Lateran Palace, in which on the right Christ was
represented as handing the keys of the Church to Pope Sylvester and a
flag to Constantine, while on the left St Peter was handing a pallium
to Leo and a similar flag to Charlemagne. Except for some fragments
in the Vatican this mosaic has disappeared, but engravings showing
it before and after restoration are to be found in a description of
the Lateran published at Rome in 1625[33]. In these the flags are
depicted as attached by one side to a staff, whilst the fly is cut
into three pointed tails. The field in both flags is charged with six
roses, but the reproduction made from early drawings by Benedict XIV in
1743, which is still in existence at Rome in the Tribune against the
Santa Scala, shows the flag on the right, which is of a green colour,
sprinkled with golden stars, not roses. In the year 800 Charlemagne was
crowned emperor at Rome, and received from the Patriarch of Jerusalem
the keys of that city together with a flag the form of which is not
stated. Evidently these flags were symbols of authority, as we have
seen the vexillum to have been centuries before.
There are several instances during the succeeding centuries of this
ceremonial presentation of a flag by high ecclesiastical authorities
to the leaders of expeditions whose aims received the approval of
the Church, the most important, from our point of view, being the
presentation made to William the Conqueror before his expedition to
England. Beside these there appear to have been other flags in use
which symbolised the patronage and protection of some especial saint,
as for instance the vexillum of St Maurice borne in the Spanish
campaigns of Charlemagne.
It seems probable that the laterally-attached form of flag had its
origin in the East, for Ximenes de Rada, Archbishop of Toledo, who died
in 1247, mentions this form as one of the special characteristics of
the Arabs who overcame Roderic in 711 A.D. and conquered Spain[34].
It is true that, as will be seen in the next chapter, the Danes were
using this form in the ninth century, but it is more probable that
they had adopted it from the Franks than that they had invented it;
certainly the only standards of the Germanic tribes known to the
Romans were animal emblems, which were kept in the sacred groves until
required in battle[35].
The form of flag that first comes into evidence in the Lateran mosaic,
that in which the flag is attached laterally to the staff while the fly
is cut into three pointed tails, appears again upon two Carlovingian
book-covers of carved ivory, one of the ninth and one of the tenth
century, now preserved in South Kensington Museum. Neither of these
bears any device upon it, but in another book-cover of the twelfth
century in the same collection a small cross saltire appears in the
body of the flag, and the tails are proportionately of much greater
length. This form, to which the term "gonfanon" became applied, was the
principal form in use until the twelfth century, when it began to be
replaced by the rectangular banner, which offered a more suitable field
for the display of the personal devices that afterwards developed into
heraldic charges.
The most important historical monument that has survived to illustrate
the use of the gonfanon is the celebrated piece of embroidery known as
the Bayeux Tapestry. We need not here enter into the controversy that
has so long raged over the question of the exact date to be assigned
to this unique work. The weight of evidence inclines strongly toward
a date within the last two decades of the eleventh century, but if
we admit a date as late as 1150 A.D. it will not materially affect
the conclusions we shall draw. In addition to five rather rudimentary
forms at the mastheads of the ships, twenty-five gonfanons in all are
depicted, two with five tails, one with four, and the remainder with
three. Only a small proportion of the hundreds of armed men who appear
in the various scenes of military activity portrayed bear gonfanons on
their spears. These are the greater leaders--the barons, as the Normans
called them. The variation in the number of tails is probably merely
an incidental caprice of the designer or embroiderers, but there is
one gonfanon which greatly exceeds the rest in size and in the length
of its tails, which in this case alone are shown of such length as to
curl in the wind[36]. It appears in the representation of that crucial
moment in the battle at which the Normans, taken with a sudden panic,
and believing that their Duke had fallen, were about to quit the fight,
when William, lifting his helmet from his face, turned towards them
and called out that he was still alive and by God's help would yet
conquer. At the same time, a companion figure, which from the mutilated
superscription in the tapestry appears to be Eustace of Boulogne, lifts
this gonfanon high in the air with his left hand while with the right
he points to the Duke's face; a significant action, calling attention
in a twofold manner to William's presence. This gonfanon is probably
the one consecrated and sent by Pope Alexander; the principal flag of
the Norman army on the day of battle[37]. It cannot be supposed that
the most elaborate flag in the whole tapestry is merely the personal
gonfanon of Eustace, and indeed the assertion of M. Marignan that the
device shown in this gonfanon represents the arms of the Counts of
Boulogne has been sufficiently refuted by Dr Round[38]. As a matter
of fact this device (which may be described as a cross formy between
four roundels) was not an uncommon one at that period. It will be found
upon the reverse of many of the coins of the Holy Roman Emperors from
Charlemagne onwards and upon those of some of the English monarchs
before the Conquest. On the other hand, the gonfanons which appear in
earlier scenes in the tapestry either in William's hand or in the hand
of the gonfanoner in attendance on him, display only a plain Greek
cross. It is therefore not unreasonable to assume that this particular
device was associated with sovereign power and would consequently be
suitable for a banner that was intended to be an outward sign of the
Pope's claim to transfer the sovereignty of England from Harold to
William. Moreover, according to Wace, William formally adopted the
consecrated gonfanon as his own before the battle:
Li Dus apela un servant
Son gonfanon fist traire avant
Ke li Pape li enveia,
E cil le trait, cil le despleia:
Li Dus le prist, suz le dreça
Raol de Conches apela
Portez dist-il mon gonfanon
The Duke called a servant
Caused his gonfanon to be brought forward
Which the Pope sent him
And the man brought it, he unfolded it
The Duke took it, raised it erect
Called to him Raol de Conches
Bear, said he, my gonfanon.
_Roman de Rou_, V, 12713-9.
Thus it appears that William's original gonfanon was not borne in the
battle, but was replaced by the consecrated flag, which would thereby
become the rallying point for the army and the special sign of the
Duke's location in the field.
Raol, who was the hereditary gonfanoner of the Duke of Normandy, asked
permission to decline the honour of bearing the consecrated flag on
the ground that he wished to take part in the fighting, as did Gautier
Giffard, to whom it was subsequently offered, and it was finally handed
to Toustain.
Before we deal with the remaining flags we must first examine the
square object shown at the masthead of William's ship the 'Mora.' This
has been commonly supposed to be the "consecrated banner" in question,
but, as pointed out by Freeman[39], it is really a great lantern. The
Norman army embarked at St Valery in the estuary of the Somme late in
the afternoon of the 27th Sept., and before William had got on board
the 'Mora' the sun had set. As he did not wish the fleet to make the
English coast before daybreak, he gave orders that on reaching the
open sea the ships were to anchor near him until he gave a signal by
lighting the lantern at the masthead and sounding the trumpet, when
they were to follow him across[40]. The object above the lantern, which
resembles a cross, may be intended to represent the weather-vane spoken
of by Wace:
Une lanterne fist le Dus
Metre en sa nef el mast de sus
Ke les altres nès le veissent
Et empres li lor cors tenissent
Une wire-wire dorée
Out de cuivre en somet levée.
The Duke caused a lantern
To be placed in his ship at the masthead
So that the other ships might see it
And hold their course near him.
A gilded weather-vane
Of copper it had raised on top.
_Roman de Rou_, V, 11592-7.
The remaining flag of the Norman army is an enigma. In form, the
segment of a circle fringed along the circumference, it contains a
representation of a bird with closed wings and outstretched claws,
placed with its back to the staff, so that when the spear is held
inclined forward, as in the Tapestry, it appears to be standing on the
ground. The suggestion of Meyrick that this represents an ancestral
flag of the men of the Cotentin, the descendants of the Danes of Harold
Blaatand, is more ingenious than satisfying, for the Danish raven was
never depicted in this tame position. Its attitude resembles that of
the hawks seen perched on Guy's hand in the two early scenes in which
he leads Harold to William, and indeed in the lower border, which
throughout the tapestry contains frequent allusions to the events
depicted above it, there appears immediately below this flag a hawk
chasing a rabbit. From its unusual--not to say unique--form it would
seem to belong to a people of different race from that of the bulk of
the army, and the only body of men present in William's army fulfilling
this condition were the Celts of Brittany, whose leader Alan had
command of the third division of the army, and whose flag therefore
must have been one of the most important of those in the field.
On the English side, the most important object is the Dragon Standard
(Plate I, fig. 2) which is symbolically shown in two positions: upright
in the hand of the standard-bearer, and fallen to the ground with
its bearer lying dead across its staff. Immediately behind it Harold
himself is likewise represented twice, first upright and drawing the
arrow from his eye, and then prone, receiving his final wound. A little
before this, in the scene which portrays the death of Harold's brothers
Gyrth and Leofwine, there lies on the ground a triangular flag, with
fringed tails hanging from the lower edge, a form similar to that
found on the tenth century Northumbrian coins[41]. This is the only
flag which, like the standard, is lying on the ground; its overthrow
must therefore have had a great symbolic importance in the mind of
the designer of the tapestry, and the only flag that we know of which
would fulfil this condition is that one against which the brothers took
their stand (see p. 32). This was the flag upon which the figure of a
fighting man was worked in gold, and although the tapestry does not
show this figure (probably because there is not room for it), there can
be little doubt that the representation of that flag is intended.
L'estendart unt à terre mis
E li Reis Heraut unt occis
E li meillor de ses amis;
Li gonfanon à or unt pris.
They have overthrown the standard
And slain King Harold
And the best of his friends;
They have taken the gold-worked
gonfanon.
_Roman de Rou_, V, 13956-9.
We have, in the preceding pages, traced the development of the flag
up to the closing years of the eleventh century without finding any
evidence of the existence of a national flag, that is, of a flag flown,
not to denote the presence of some particular leader at sea or on the
field of battle, or that some especial religious sanction or blessing
had been conferred or expected, but to indicate that the ship, town or
other strong place upon which it was placed owned allegiance to some
particular state or sovereign authority: a flag that might, on suitable
occasion, be flown by any subjects of that state, not as their personal
ensign but as a symbol of the collective body of which they were
members.
While the Roman Empire stood at the height of its power, with the whole
civilised world under its dominion, there was no need of any such
device; and long after it had in fact passed away the theory of its
nominal existence survived and hindered the development of any national
consciousness. It is clear that this feeling must have been strong
since we find it shared by such a man as Theodoric the Ostrogoth,
who, although _de facto_ ruler of Italy from 493 to his death in 526,
professed his allegiance to the Eastern Empire and showed anxiety
to get his position recognised by the Emperor at Constantinople.
The history of the next five hundred years is that of a continuous
succession of struggles for power and possession of territory between
kings, nobles and ecclesiastics, and although the crowning of
Charlemagne by the Pope in 800 was a formal repudiation by Rome of the
authority of the Eastern Emperor there is no indication that the idea
of nationality had yet arisen in the minds of men. The flag which Leo
III presented to him was not in any way a national emblem; it was the
symbol of his supreme authority and no more. In the ninth and tenth
centuries there existed a certain number of religious flags of greater
or less reputation for their wonder-working powers, of which the
Oriflamme of Saint Denis may be taken as the type, but these were never
national in the sense in which we have defined this word above.
The great movement known as the Crusades, which commenced at the end of
the eleventh century, and after two hundred years of failure, relieved
by a few transient successes, finally exhausted the enthusiasm of
western Europe at the end of the thirteenth century, has been claimed
as one of the main causes of the growth of national sentiment. In a
sense this is no doubt correct, though it is equally true that its
failure was primarily due to the national antagonisms of the peoples
who took part in the expeditions to the Holy Land, and the partisan
jealousies and individual self-seeking of their leaders. But there is
no doubt as to the effect it had in widening the mental horizon of
all the peoples of western Europe, and it is therefore not surprising
to find indications of a development of flag design during the course
of the struggle. Nevertheless, if we expect to find traces of any
national or popular flags among the early crusaders we shall be
disappointed. The kings, nobles, and military orders of the Temple
and Hospital had each their own special banner, but the common people
had none, and it was not until the year 1188, one hundred years after
the first crusaders had entered Syria, that a means was provided
for distinguishing the rank and file of different nationalities by
a variation in the colour of the crosses upon their shoulders. From
the beginning, the cross set upon the clothing of rich and poor alike
had been the outward symbol of a common religion and, in theory,
of a common aim among all who took part in the conflicts with the
followers of Mahomet, but the flags which led the armies into action
and crowned the towers of captured castles or the gates of towns were
those of the individual leaders. Squabbles over the precedence of such
flags were not infrequent. The well-known instance of Richard I and
Philip of France at Messina in 1190 was perhaps the most important
in its after effects, but it was by no means the first or last of
such occurrences. In 1098 the Emir in command of one of the castles
in the neighbourhood of Antioch, seeing that the Saracens had been
dispersed, and fearful for the result if the Christians assaulted the
castle, offered to surrender, and asked for a Christian flag, which
he placed on the highest point of the walls. He took that nearest to
hand, which happened to be that of Raymond of Toulouse. The followers
of Bohemond were very angry at this, and in the end the Emir gave back
Raymond's banner and erected that of Bohemond in its place. In August
of the following year the Emir of Ascalon, frightened by the fall of
Jerusalem, made a similar offer of surrender to Raymond and hoisted his
flag over the gate of the city. Godfrey of Bouillon, who had just been
elected ruler of Jerusalem, claimed possession for himself, whereupon
the Emir sent back Raymond's flag and refused to surrender to either of
them.
The placing of the flag of one of the crusading leaders upon castle or
town was usually sufficient to protect that place from further assault,
but it was not always respected. On the capture of Jerusalem in July,
1099, a remnant of the wretched inhabitants who had escaped torture and
massacre at the hands of the Christians, had taken refuge on the roof
of the mosque which occupied the site of Solomon's Temple. Tancred,
moved by pity, wished to spare them, and he and Gaston de Bearn gave
them their gonfanons as a protection. This served them for a few hours,
but the Crusaders had not tasted enough blood, and early next morning,
ignoring the protection thus formally granted, they shot them down
with arrows or put them to the sword--men and women alike. Raymond and
Tancred had in a like manner given protection to the defenders of the
Tower of David, who received their flags "as a sign of protection and
life." Raymond was more successful, perhaps because the Tower of David
was not so easily entered, and he succeeded in getting the prisoners
away safely, thereby giving rise to the scandalous imputation that he
had neglected his duty and sold his protection for gold.
Our last instance of the use of the flag during this (the first)
Crusade will concern its employment at sea. In May, 1102, Jaffa was
being threatened by the Saracens, and Baldwin, then King of Jerusalem,
was anxious to encourage the inhabitants to hold out. The Saracen
forces prevented him from getting there by land; he therefore embarked
at Arsuf in a buss, together with one Goderic, who is described by
Albert of Aix as an English pirate. On approaching Jaffa the flag of
Baldwin was fastened to a spear and raised high in the sun, so that the
Christians in Jaffa, on seeing it, might be sure that Baldwin was still
living. The Saracens also recognised it, and hastily collecting a force
of twenty galleys and thirteen other craft, attempted to sink the buss.
The king, however, got through in safety.
We have, unfortunately, no exact description of the various flags
mentioned, for the contemporary writers do not condescend to give
such details, though they occasionally allude to some characteristic
feature. Thus the flag of Bohemond is stated to have been of a red
colour (_rubicundum, sanguineum_) while that of Robert of Normandy was
yellow (_aureum_). That of Baldwin is referred to several times as
being white. On one occasion it was torn from his lance through being
driven into the body of an Arab whom he slew. The flags[42] borne on
lances in battle were evidently of gonfanon form, as there are several
references to the tails flying in the faces or over the heads of the
enemy, but it seems that there were also a number of larger flags,
for several of the greater leaders, including Bishop Adhemar the
Papal Legate, had a special flag-bearer (_vexillifer_). These were
probably also of gonfanon form during the First Crusade, for the deep
rectangular banner does not appear to have been introduced until the
Second Crusade.
It seems that crosses were borne in some of the flags, but there is
no mention of any personal device, though some flags are stated to
have been resplendent with purple and precious stones. It is commonly
supposed that the introduction to western Europe of the cross of St
George (the red cross on white ground) dates from this first crusade,
yet it does not appear at that time to have been associated with him.
On the 28th June, 1098, the crusaders besieged in Antioch by Corbogha,
finding themselves within measurable distance of destruction by famine,
determined to risk all upon a pitched battle. In this forlorn hope they
were completely successful. Unable to account for this by any earthly
cause, they imagined that they had seen a great army on white horses,
clothed in white and bearing white banners in their hands, issue from
the neighbouring mountains and come to their assistance. The leaders of
this ghostly army, recognised by their names written on their banners,
were St George, St Demetrius, and St Mercurius[43]. If at this time the
red cross had become the distinctive sign of St George one or other of
these writers would surely have mentioned it, but all agree that the
banners were white.
We may gather a few more details regarding the flags of the crusading
period from some of the earlier _chansons de geste_. The gonfanon, the
use of which was confined to the nobility, was fastened to the shaft of
the spear before going into action by three or five nails[44], and it
must have needed a strong fastening if it was to remain on the spear
throughout the battle. Indeed, the poets give a realistic touch to
their descriptions of the various combats by narrating how their heroes
drove the cloth of the gonfanon into the body of the foe. As they sat
upright upon their horses the tails of the gonfanon reached down to
their hands or even to their feet.
Dunc met sa main en sa vermeille chalce
Si traist tut fors une enseigne de palie
A treis clous d'or en sa lance la lacet
Ot le braz destre brandist l'espié en haste
Des i qu'as poinz les lengues d'or li'n batent.
Then thrust his hand into his scarlet hose
And drew forth an ensign of rich silk
With three golden nails fastened it to his lance
In his right hand brandished the spear with vigor
Down to his fist the golden tongues beat down.
_Guillaume d'Orange_, _v._ 317.
The designs are simple in colour--red, white, yellow--and there is no
mention of any charge upon them, though in one instance a red gonfanon
is marked by a golden cross:
L'espié trait en sa main au vermel gonfanon
Une Crois i ot d'or.
_Conquête de Jerusalem_, _v._ 425.
The pennons were carried by knights; they appear to have been of
similar colours to the gonfanons, but were much smaller.
Tos chevaliers, n'i a cel n'ait penon.
(All knights, there was not one but had a pennon.)
_Ogier l'Ardenois_, _v._ 4440.
We have already noticed that the name "Standard" appears first applied
to a Saracen ensign. Further corroboration of this is supplied by the
_Chanson d'Antioche_ and _Le Conquête de Jerusalem_. In the latter poem
the author (Richard the Pilgrim) has imagined a wonderful standard
carried on an iron chariot and made of ivory and various precious
woods, and of an enormous height:
L. toises longes i puet on brachoier
Onques nus homs de char ne vit si haut clochier.
The custom of marking the flag with some distinctive heraldic device
appears to have been introduced about the middle of the twelfth
century, for the seal of Philip of Flanders (A.D. 1161) shows the
Flemish lion on his banner. During the Third Crusade, which followed
upon the re-capture of Jerusalem by Saladin (October, 1187), the
banner[45] of Richard I of England, which flew from the top of the
"Standard" already described, contained a single lion, while that of
his great rival, Philip Augustus of France, was blue powdered with gold
fleurs-de-lis. The Knights of the Temple, who first come into view in
1128, adopted a banner half black and half white (drear and black to
their foes but fair and favourable to their friends) to which they gave
the name _bauçan_[46]. Their rivals, the Knights of the Hospital of
St John in Jerusalem, who first enter into military activity in 1136,
had a red banner with a white cross upon it. The representation in
Plate I (fig. 5) is taken from an early manuscript of Matthew Paris and
shows a Latin cross; the eight-pointed cross[47], associated with this
order, was rarely used except on the vestments of the order, though it
occasionally appears on the banner of the commander-in-chief.
Mention has already been made of the consecrated flags which it was
customary for the Pope to present to the leaders of expeditions which
had the approbation of the Church. The flag entrusted to the Bishop
of Puy, the Papal Legate present at the First Crusade, was of this
nature. It is referred to in 1098 as the _signum magni papae_. In
1104 when Paschal sent Bohemond into France to gather support for him
against the Emperor, he entrusted him with another of these flags, to
which the name _vexillum Sancti Petri_ is applied. This change of name
would appear to indicate a difference in the device on the flag. That
difference was probably the introduction of the two Keys of St Peter
beside the cross, a point of some interest to us as it might affect the
question of the identity of the gonfanon on the Bayeux Tapestry already
discussed, and incidentally the date of that work. We have, however, no
certain knowledge of the presence of these keys before the year 1203.
In March of that year Innocent III sent to Calojohannes, King of the
Bulgars and Wends, one of these flags, together with a letter in which
he explained its symbolism at some length. This flag contained a cross
and the two keys symbolic of the powers entrusted to Peter according
to the tradition of the Church[48]. From the tenor of this letter it
may be inferred that the device was not a new one in 1203, so that this
was no doubt the device upon the _vexillum S. Petri_ met with during
the Third Crusade in 1199 and 1201. An interesting instance of the use
of a flag to convey authority occurs in 1216, when Rupen, nephew of
Leo of Armenia, was formally seised of the lordship of Antioch by the
patriarch of that city handing him a flag in the church of St Peter.
Thus far we are still without evidence of the existence of any flag
that could be described as "national," and we shall therefore turn
our attention to the birthplace of so much that was great in art and
literature, the Italian city-states, and since we are primarily seeking
evidence as to the early use of the flag at sea (though hitherto
without much success) we shall turn first to the maritime states of
Genoa and Pisa.
Of these two, Pisa was the first to rise as an important maritime
city, and in 980 she was supplying vessels to transport the troops of
the Emperor Otho II. By the end of the eleventh century a system of
government by Consuls had been firmly established, and the city can be
looked upon as an independent state. Shortly after this (in 1114) the
Pisans proceeded to capture the Balearic Isles from the Saracens. A
contemporary metrical account[49] of this struggle gives an indication
of the flags then in use in the following words:
Tunc vexilla gerens Pisanae signifer urbis
Valandus cuneos in campum ducit apertum.
Hinc Ildebrandus sanctae vexilla Mariae
Consul habens dextra saevos incurrit in hostes,
Sedis Apostolicae vexillum detulit Atho.
Here we have evidence of at least three different flags in the Pisan
host: the Standard-bearer of the city carries the communal flag, the
nature of which is not indicated (in 1242 and 1350 it was a plain red
flag); Hildebrand the Consul carries a flag[50] of the B. V. Mary; and
Atho carries the papal flag[51], which had no doubt been presented
by the Pope when sending his benediction to the expedition through
the Archbishop of Pisa. These flags were fastened to spears (_hastis
vexilla micabant_) which were used in the conflict without regard to
the sanctity of the emblems borne on them:
Tunc Ildebrandus consul dirum Niceronta
Transfodiens ferro per pectus dirigit hastam
Vexillumque trahit madefactum sanguine Mauri.
This matter-of-fact method of utilising the flag of the B. V. Mary by
thrusting its staff through the breast of an enemy and withdrawing
it stained with his blood does not accord with modern notions of the
sanctity of the flag.
The first important step in the rise of Genoa occurred in 958, when
Berengarius and Adalbert guaranteed its communal rights. Some thirty
years after this the Cathedral was founded, and as it was dedicated to
St Lawrence it is evident that at this early date St George had not yet
become the patron saint of the city.
The original manuscript of the _Annales Genuenses_, which narrate (not
without partisan bias) the principal events affecting the state and its
relations with Pisa and other rivals during the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries, was at one time in the Archives of Genoa, but it is now in
the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. Commenced by Caffaro in 1154 on
the basis of a diary of events, which he had kept since early youth,
and continued from time to time by later writers under the instructions
of the municipal authorities, it presents a contemporary record from
the year 1099 to 1293, and, what is even more important for our
purpose, it contains in its margin a number of illustrations in which
flags appear both ashore and afloat.
Evidently, at some date after 958 the Genoese transferred their
spiritual allegiance from St Lawrence to St George in much the same way
that the Venetians had transferred their allegiance from St Theodore
to St Mark when the supposed relics of that saint were translated from
Alexandria to Venice, or as the English, in the fourteenth century,
replaced Edward the Confessor by St George, but it is not until the
year 1198 that we meet with a distinct reference by name to the flag
of St George as being that of the State. From that year onward it is
frequently referred to in terms which leave no doubt that it had been
the outward symbol of Genoese power from a much earlier period. Indeed,
in an illustration, against the year 1113, of the castle of Porto
Venere, then newly built by the Genoese, there flies above the castle a
large three-tailed gonfanon bearing a cross that extends to the three
sides and to the commencement of the tails. This is a pen-and-ink
sketch, so that the colour of the cross is not shown, but there can be
little doubt that this was a flag of St George. I say _a_ flag of St
George because, although the red cross on white was ultimately adopted
as the State ensign, _the_ State flag of St George in the thirteenth
century was not a cross at all; it was an actual representation of St
George himself on horseback in the familiar attitude of slaying the
dragon with a spear. This is shown clearly in a coloured miniature
which accompanies the events of 1227. In that year, at the commencement
of the struggle between the papacy and the Emperor, the Genoese laid
siege to Savona and the neighbouring town of Albizzola, which were
attempting to withdraw from their allegiance to their great neighbour
and to take sides with the Emperor Frederick. The artist depicts the
siege operations against these two towns, and shows the principal
citizens of Savona on their knees before the Podesta of Genoa in his
tent, humbly offering their submission[52]. Before the tent floats a
large red gonfanon, rectangular in form, and with four square-ended
tails, having the above-mentioned device in a light yellow colour, and
the word "vexillum" written under it to call attention to the fact that
it was the State flag.
The record of the events in 1242 provides a typical example of the use
of this flag of St George by the Genoese. Having heard on the 10th July
that the Emperor Frederick had sent sixty galleys and two great ships
under the command of Ansaldus de Mari to Pisa, and that the Pisans were
themselves fitting out fifty-eight galleys and other vessels under
Buscarius Pisanus, the Genoese immediately fitted out eighty-three
galleys, with thirteen tarids[53] and four great ships, at Genoa. These
were all painted white with red crosses in lieu of the sea-green colour
in which they had hitherto been accustomed to paint their vessels[54].
Instructions were then sent throughout all the districts owning
allegiance to the city that all men should prepare to embark, armed and
supplied with victuals. The Podesta[55] then collected the people in
the Square of St Lawrence, and after delivering an oration encouraging
them for the coming conflict, he, amid general rejoicing, solemnly took
possession of the state flag of St George, "to the honour of God and
of Holy Church and the confusion of their enemies," and constituted
himself Admiral of the fleet. His next step was to superintend the
election of eight Protentini and ninety-six Comiti according to
districts[56]. He then handed to each Protentinus, who became the
Squadron Commander of one of the eight squadrons into which the fleet
was divided, a splendidly worked flag embodying the device of his
district (_vexillum unum juxta formam cuiuslibet compagnae mirabiliter
designatum_) and to each Comitus two flags; one of the State device
(_vexillum ad signum communis_), evidently the red cross of St George,
which he was to place on the starboard quarter of his ship, and the
other containing the lion of St Mark (_vexillum ad signum Venetorum
Sancti Marchi_), which was to be placed on the port quarter. This is an
extraordinary instance of the use of dual national flags in a fleet,
and was the consequence of a treaty made between Genoa and Venice in
1238 whereby the two great rival sea powers agreed that their war
vessels should bear the flags of both States as a token of amity and
alliance between them. The Admiral's flag was then erected in one of
the best galleys, and the Protentini (Squadron Commanders) and Comiti
(Captains) proceeded to hoist theirs in the galleys and tarids assigned
to them, which were then apportioned off to the various squadrons. No
officers were appointed to the four great ships (_naves magnae_), which
were evidently victualling and store ships, relying almost entirely
upon sail power for propulsion and therefore of little use in fighting
at that period. As there were 96 comiti and 96 fighting ships, it is
clear that the galleys of the Admiral and of the eight Protentini had
each three flags, the State flag and the district flags being probably
placed in the bows. This appears to be the first recorded instance of
the division of a fleet into squadrons by means of flags. The most
striking detail of the interesting events in 1227 and 1242--one that
has hitherto escaped attention--is the fact that in the Republic of
Genoa, one of the earliest States to adopt a national flag, two forms
of that flag existed side by side; one containing a representation
of the patron saint (_vexillum Beati Georgii_) flown only in the
presence of the chief of the State or the Commander-in-chief, the other
containing merely the red cross emblematic of that saint, the general
device of the community (_signum communis_), in other words the flag of
the common people. Thus the supreme power and the common source of that
power are represented distinctly, and in such a way as to indicate that
fundamentally they were one and the same thing.
There are other instances in these Annals from which it is clear that
the flag of St George was erected only in the galley of the Admiral.
Indeed in 1282 it was expressly ordained by the _Sapientes Credentiae_
(Council of XV) that no leader should have the title of Admiral, but
only of Captain, unless he had at least ten galleys under his command,
and that the flag of St George should not be borne at sea unless the
fleet comprised ten or more galleys.
On the farther side of Italy another great maritime power had sprung
into existence at Venice. Owing to its remoteness from the lines of
military communication and the protection of its surrounding lagoons,
Venice enjoyed a comparative immunity from outside interference that
enabled her to form a settled government at a much earlier date
than had been possible at Genoa or Pisa, although the city was of
much later origin. In such circumstances one might suppose that the
Venetians would choose a national symbol at an early period, and that
the famous Lion of St Mark was adopted for this purpose shortly after
the translation of the relics of that saint to Venice in 828 A.D.[57]
I have, however, not met with any reference to this celebrated flag
earlier than the passage in which Villehardouin describes the attack of
the Crusaders on Constantinople in July, 1203. As the fleet approached
the walls of the city the aged and blind Doge Dandolo stood at the prow
of his galley with the Gonfanon of St Mark displayed before him. When
he landed the Gonfanon was carried before him,
And when the Venetians saw the Gonfanon of St Mark on land and the
galley of their leader which had been beached in front of them,
then each man felt himself shamed, and all approached the land, and
those in the huissiers (horse transports) leapt out and went on
shore, and those in the great ships got into barges and got to the
shore as quickly as each one could.
It will be noted that there was but one gonfanon of St Mark, that borne
before the leader, although there were evidently many other flags, for
in describing the preparation of the fleet for action a little earlier
Villehardouin states that banners and gonfanons were erected on the
castles of the ships, and that shields were placed along the sides[58].
Here we have evidently an arrangement of flags somewhat similar to that
already described as prevailing in the Genoese fleet. The State flag
is confided to the commander-in-chief, while other ships display the
banners of the subordinate leaders.
But it is doubtful whether the idea of a national ensign originated
in the maritime states. The first of the Italian cities to adopt a
democratic form of government was Milan, where the people, under the
leadership of their Archbishop, Aribert, successfully resisted the
Emperor Conrad himself. In the course of the struggle, about the year
1038, Aribert introduced as a rallying point for his people in battle
a movable standard, which is described by Arnulf as a lofty beam, like
the mast of a ship, fixed on a strong wagon and bearing a golden apple
at the summit, from which hung two white streamers (_pendentibus duobus
candissimi veli limbis_). Midway on this pole was placed a crucifix,
to which the eyes of the citizens might turn for comfort whatever the
fortunes of the fight might be. This device was afterwards adopted by
most of the city-states of Italy, and under the name of _carroccio_
(chariot) will be met with frequently in their annals. In its later
development an altar was placed at the base of the mast, while the
wagon, drawn by white oxen, was hung with scarlet cloth and the city
flag floated at the masthead.
Among the cities that adopted this form of standard were Cremona,
where it was named "Berta," Brescia, Bologna, Florence and Parma.
In the case of Parma, where the standard was called "Blancardo," an
interesting instance of its symbolic importance other than in battle is
recorded. In 1303, when Ghiberto of Correggio obtained possession of
that city, he got himself confirmed as "lord, defender, and protector
of that city, and was invested by the resignation into his hands of the
standard of the Virgin and the flag of the Carroccio[59]."
This investiture by flag, already illustrated in the case of
Charlemagne and Rupen, is worthy of two further illustrations. In 1329
Padua recognised Alberto della Scala as its lord by presenting him with
the flag of the people (_vexillum populi_) in public assembly, and in
1406 acknowledged its overthrow by Venice by presenting the same symbol
to the Doge Steno. In this year also Verona acknowledged its defeat by
surrendering to the Venetians its communal flag (a white cross on red
ground) and its _vexillum populi_ (a golden cross on azure field).
As a final example of the use of flags in the mediaeval Italian
republics we may take the case of Florence. In October, 1250, in the
course of a sanguinary struggle between the Guelphs and Ghibellines,
the popular party (then Guelph)
marched in military array to San Lorenzo, and there elected thirty
leaders, annulled a portion of the functions of the Podestà, and
appointed as guardian of the new government a captain of the
people, Messer Uberto da Lucca, with whom were to be associated
twelve elders (two for each division of the town) as councillors
for him and advisers of the people.
The captain was to be a foreigner; but the elders were to be
Florentines.
The fighting population was divided into twenty companies each with
a standard of its own, and the force thus created was intended,
under the leadership of the captain, to defend the liberties of the
people within the town. Outside Florence the army was still to be
commanded by the Podestà. The captain's standard showed a red cross
on a white field: to this day the ensign of the town of Florence.
The nobles and the powerful burghers (popolani) formed a separate
force--that of the knights. Each sesto or division of the town had
a separate ensign for its troop of cavalry, and these banners, with
many others, were given solemnly by the Podestà on every Whitsunday.
The contado was also divided into companies under respective
standards, and when called into the town, fell naturally into line
with the city bands.
All these changes were intended to check the power of the
Ghibellines, who soon came to be so hated by the majority of
Florentines that a common banner even was felt as an intolerable
evil, and the Guelph party adopted a red lily on a white field,
leaving the white lily on a red field (the old arms of the commune)
to the opposite faction[60].
Here again we have two national flags as at Genoa, but with a marked
difference in the underlying meaning. One, the red flag with white
lily, the ensign of the aristocratic classes: the other, the red cross,
that of the common people.
From the facts set forth in the preceding pages (and they are supported
by a number of less important details with which we shall not weary
the readers' attention) it may be inferred that national flags came
into being during the course of the twelfth century and had a twofold
origin. In the case of the smaller states organised on a popular basis
under continually changing Consuls or magistrates, they arose from the
necessity of having some clearly recognisable rallying point in action
that was not personal and therefore subject to frequent change. This
was supplied either by a common devotion to a particular saint, as at
Genoa and Venice, or by the adoption of one particular colour, as at
Pisa, or in the solitary case of Rome, the greatest of all in wealth
of historic memories, by the re-adoption of an ancient classic device,
the S.P.Q.R. of the Senatus Populusque Romanus. In the larger states,
which from their very size were at that period necessarily organised on
a feudal basis, the banner of the sovereign lord became the national
flag. This was what happened in France and (as will appear in the next
chapter) also happened in England.
In this, the most memorable advance in the use of flags, it was the
city-states of Italy that led the way; and it was the great development
during the Crusades of the activity of the maritime states of Genoa,
Venice and Pisa that spread the example throughout Europe.
By the end of the thirteenth century the maritime city-states of
northern Europe, which had arisen to prominence in consequence of the
development of their shipping under the influence of the Crusades, had
begun to make regulations governing the use of their flags at sea. Thus
the maritime laws of Hamburg, to which Pardessus[61] assigns a date
prior to 1270, contained a provision to the effect that every burgher
of that town should fly at sea a red flag[62], under penalty of three
silver marks, unless the flag had been lowered in time of danger,
and a like penalty was to be inflicted on any stranger who flew this
flag, on plaint being made against him. A similar provision appears in
the Maritime Law of Riga of the same date, with the difference that
the flag is to bear a white cross, the colour of the field not being
stated, though at a later date it is given as black. The Laws of Lubeck
contain a like provision in 1299, the "Lubeschen Vloghel[63]" being
presumably the flag, white and red in two horizontal bands, flown by
that town until its absorption into the German Empire.
Two years earlier, in 1297, appeared the first recorded provision for
the bearing of an English flag at sea, and we may therefore, with the
close of the thirteenth century, quit the wide field of research that
we have been attempting to survey for a more detailed investigation of
the history of British national flags.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] I.e. Flag (Danish and Norse), Flagg (Swedish), Flagge (German),
Vlag (Dutch).
[2] See Plate II, fig. 10.
[3] E.g. Albert of Aix: longissima hasta quod vocant standart. Baldric
of Dol: admiravisi stantarum. Peter Tudebode: Quod stantarum apud nos
dicitur vexillum. Robert the Monk: vexillum admiravissi quod standarum
vocant.
[4] _Historia_, lib. VI: this with the other authorities quoted will be
found in the _Recueil des Historiens des Croisades_.
[5] Unde quia stat fortissime compaginatum in signum populorum a stando
standardum vocitatur.
[6] In 1337 streamers were from 14 to 32 ells long and 3 to 5 cloths
wide; standards were 9 ells long and 3 cloths wide; while banners were
1¾ ells long and 2 cloths wide.
[7] E.g. those of William II, Henry I, Stephen and Alexander I of
Scotland.
[8] _The Theorike and Practike of moderne warres_, 1598.
[9] The fact that the object represented is really a boat has been
disputed, but there seem to be no good grounds for the objections made.
The question is discussed by Dr Wallis Budge in his _Egypt in the
Neolithic and Archaic Periods_ (Books on Egypt and Chaldea, vol. IX),
pp. 71 et seq.
[10] They are represented in de Morgan's _Recherches sur les Origines
de l'Egypte_, in Dr Wallis Budge's work just cited, p. 78, and in
Capart's _Primitive Art in Egypt_, p. 210.
[11] Ezekiel, chap. xxvii.
[12] See the British Museum _Catalogue of Greek coins (Phoenicia)_,
edited by Mr G. F. Hill, and Mr Hill's remarks in his introduction, p.
xxii.
[13] In Figs. 1, 2, 3 and 5.
[14] For a more detailed discussion of these standards see papers by
Dr Assmann and Mr Hill in the _Zeitschrift für Numismatik_, vol. xxv,
and by Prof. E. Babelon in the _Revue Numismatique_ for 1907. Prof.
Babelon holds that this cruciform staff is the object which the Greeks
called στυλις [Greek: stylis], a word whose meaning has never been
satisfactorily determined, and that its primary object was to support
the "aphlaston." The other writers do not concur. His theory that the
boards which formed the aphlaston were movable and, supported by the
"stylis," served to aid the navigation of the ship will not, I think,
command many adherents.
[15] Pontremoli et Collignon: _Pergame, Restauration et description des
Monuments de l'Acropole_, Paris, 1900.
[16] See the instances quoted in the chapter on signals, p. 140.
[17] τὸ βαρβαρικὸν ἀνέτεινε σημεῖον [Greek: to barbarikon aneteine
sêmeion]. _Strategemata_, VIII, 53 (iii). Polyaenus flourished circa
150 A.D. and was therefore writing long after the event he relates, but
he appears to have had access to earlier authors whose works have now
perished.
[18] Herodotus, VII, 100, 128.
[19] _Strategemata_, III, 11 (xi).
[20] E.g. Diodorus Siculi, XIII, 46, 77; Polyaenus, I, 48 (ii);
Polybius, II, 66 (ii).
[21] Φοινικις [Greek: Phoinikis] said to be derived from Φοίνιξ [Greek:
Phoinix] dark red or purple. Φοίνιξ [Greek: Phoinix] which also
denotes a Phoenician is of doubtful etymology and may have been derived
from the name of the date palm.
[22] _Vide_ Stuart Jones, _Companion to Roman History_.
[23] _Natural History_, Book X, 5 (4).
[24] Caesar, _B.G._ II, 20: vexillum proponendum, quod erat insigne,
quum ad arma concurri oporteret.
[25] Tacitus, _Hist._ V, 22: Namque praetoriam navem vexillo insignem,
illic ducem rati, abripiunt.
[26] _De Re Militari_, III, 5: "Muta signa sunt aquilae, dracones,
vexilla, flammulae, tufae, pinnae. Quocunque enim haec ferri iusserit
ductor, eo necesse est signum suum comitantes milites pergant." He is
here using the word _signum_ in the sense of signal, and divides these
signals into _vocalia_ or orders given by word of mouth, _semi-vocalia_
or those given by trumpet, and _muta_ or those denoted by the movement
of the standards.
[27] Du Cange, _Glossarium_: Tufa genus vexilli apud Romanos ex
confertis plumarum globis.
[28] See p. 30.
[29] _De Bello Civili_, II, 6: Conspirataeque naves triremes duae navem
D. Brut quae ex insigni facile agnosci poterant, duabus ex partibus
sese in eam incitaverant.
[30] Appian, V, 111: ἐπὶ δὲ τῇ παρακλήσει τὰ στρατηγικὰ σημεῖα, ὡς ἐν
κινδύνῳ μάλιστα ὤν, ἀπέθετο. [Greek: epi de tê paraklêsei ta stratêgika
sêmeia, hôs en kindynô malista ôn, apetheto.]
[31] Dio, LI, 21: σημείῳ κυανοειδεῖ ναυκρατητικῷ [Greek: sêmeiô
kyanoeidei naukratêtikô]. Suetonius II: caeruleo vexillo donavit.
[32] _Civil Wars_, V, 55.
[33] Alemannus, _De Lateranensibus parietinis_.
[34] _De Rebus Hispaniae_, III, 18: Arabum ... qui sua capita tegunt
vittis, ... habentes vestis diversis coloribus variegatas, tenentes
gladios et ballistas, et vexilla in altum tensa.
[35] _Germania_, VII: effigiesque et signa quaedam detracta lucis in
praelium ferunt.
[36] See Plate I, fig. 3.
[37] "There in the midst of all, the guiding star of the whole army,
floated the consecrated banner, the gift of Rome and of Hildebrand....
There rode the chief of all, the immediate leader of that choicest and
central division, the mighty Duke himself." Freeman, _Norman Conquest_,
2nd edition, III, 463. It is true that (p. 465) Freeman says "I cannot
see the banner in the tapestry," but if he was looking for a "banner"
he certainly would not find one at this early date, and Wace (v, 11451)
expressly says that it was a "gonfanon": "L'Apostoile...un gonfanon
li enveia." Freeman supposes (p. 768) that at this point Eustace is
giving advice to which William will not listen, but surely this is
a misconception of a striking incident spiritedly portrayed by the
designer.
[38] "The Bayeux Tapestry" in _Monthly Review_, Dec. 1904.
[39] _Op. cit._ p. 400: "the lantern on the Duke's mast is shown
plainly in the Tapestry."
[40] William of Poitiers (his chaplain) says: "Verum ne prius luce
littus, quo intendunt, attingentes, iniqua et minus nota statione
periclitentur; dat praeconis voce edictum, ut cum in altum sint
deductae, paululum noctis conquiescant non longe a sua rates cunctae
in anchoris fluitantes, donec in ejus mali summo lampade conspecta,
extemplo buccinae clangorem cursus accipiant signum."
[41] See Plate II, fig. 10 and p. 31.
[42] The chroniclers adopt no technical terms for the flags, but use
_vexillum_ or _signum_ indiscriminately, the former word being no
longer restricted to hanging flags, and being occasionally used for a
standard or even for a cross.
[43] Thus Albert of Aix; Tudebode substitutes Theodore for Mercurius,
and Robert the Monk, Maurice.
[44] _Ogier l'Ardenois_, _v._ 1744: A trois claus d'or son gonfanon
lacié. _Ibid._ _v._ 9910: A cinq claus d'or.
[45] _Itin. Regis Ricardi_: regium cum leone vexillum.
[46] Plate I, fig. 4. Vexillum balzanum, so named from "balzan," a
piebald horse; the word was subsequently corrupted to "beauseant."
[47] Known as the Maltese Cross--Malta having been handed over to the
Knights after their ejection from Rhodes by the Turks in 1522.
[48] Baluzius, _Epistolarum Innocentii III Pontificis lib. undecim._
1682: Praetendit autem non sine mysterio crucem et claves; quia beatus
Petrus Apostolus et crucem in Christo sustinuit et claves a Christo
suscepit. Repraesentat itaque signum crucis, etc.
[49] Laurentius Veronensis, _De Bello majoricano_.
[50] The plural form _vexilla_ seems to have been necessitated by the
scansion of the verse.
[51] Michael de Vico in his _Breviarium Pisanae Historiae_, written in
1371, says this was red (_vexillum vermileum_) and that thereafter the
Pisans always flew a red flag.
[52] Reproduced in colour in the _Monumenta Germaniae Historica.
Scriptores_, vol. 18. The MS. itself has also been reproduced in
photographic facsimile.
[53] The tarid at this date was shorter and broader than the galley,
and therefore able to carry a heavier burden, but it was on this
account less mobile, and therefore defensive rather than offensive
in action. These tarids were fitted out with fighting castles
(_hediffitia_ (aedificia) _mirabilia ad proelium_) to increase their
defensive qualities.
[54] Depictae colore albo cum crucibus per totum, dimisso tunc glauco
colore quo depingi solebant.
[55] Chief Magistrate or "President" of the Republic.
[56] The term "Protentinus" was adopted from the Normans then ruling
in Sicily, who had acquired it from the Byzantines. As in Sicily, the
Protentinus appears to have been primarily the chief magistrate of one
of the districts (compagnae) into which the state territory was divided
for administrative purposes, the "comitus" being one of his subordinate
officers. Thus the fleet was organised on a territorial basis. The term
"comitus" was afterwards applied to the officer occupying the position
of boatswain in a galley, but it has not that meaning at this date.
[57] A medal of Doge Pietro Candiano, 887 A.D., has on the reverse a
war vessel with a flag at the mast, too small to show any distinctive
marks.
[58] LXVI: furent drecies les banieres et li gonfanon es chastiaus des
nés, et les houces ostées des escuz et portendu li bort des nés.
[59] Sismondi, _History of the Italian Republics in the Middle Ages_,
ed. by Wm. Boulting, p. 252.
[60] Bella Duffy, _The Tuscan Republics_, pp. 78-80.
[61] _Collection de Lois Maritimes_, II, 337.
[62] In the seventeenth century this red flag was charged with a white
castle.
[63] Pardessus, II, 411.