Flag of Russia
Flag of Russia
The Flag of Russia is the tricolour of Pan-Slavic colors. It consists of three equal horisontal fields, white on the top, blue in the middle and red on the bottom.
Moscow Coat of Arms
When
Peter the Great visited the
Netherlands in
1699 in order to learn about
shipbuilding, he realised the need for Russia to have a
flag for its
navy too. So, he based the plan of the flag of Russia on the
Flag of the Netherlands, making it a tricolour with three equal horizontal fields, but he chose Russian colors for it (the flag of the Netherlands at that time was orange-white-blue, it had no red). He chose the colors of
coat of arms of the Duchy of Moscow, which had
Saint George, having white armour, riding a white horse, wearing a blue cape and holding a blue shield, on red field.
Flag ratio: 1:2
This flag became the official flag of Russia on
May 7,
1883. It was changed by Czar Nicholas II in 1914, adding the Romanov eagle on a yellow field in a canton in the top left corner. When the
Bolsheviks took power in
1917, they changed the flag (see
Flag of Russian SFSR). The current flag was re-adopted by Russia on
August 21,
1991.
The flag of Russia is the source of Pan-Slavic colors.