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Zagreb (Croatia)

City of Zagreb
County of Zagreb

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Croatia

City of Zagreb

by zeljko heimer

So, the flag is blue with white outlined coat of arms of Zagreb - a castle on ground with three towers and opened doors followed by a crescent and a star.

The arms are originating from at ca. 13th century (there are on a stone capitell with a year 1269 (IIRC), held by a lion rampart.

On images used today it is mostly uncoloured, i.e. just outline like in the flag, but the colours used were blue background, green ground, white castle, with red doors, white crescent and golden star. Sometimes it was pictured with red background, as one can see on the roof of St. Marko's church in the old town next to the Croatian Parlament (Sabor).

The flag is blue, that is traditionally colour of Zagreb (trams and buses are blue, phone boots also, etc.) The castle with open doors represents that Zagreb was declared a royal free market place, open to merchants and visitors, in 1292 by Croato-Hungarian king Bela IV which hid himself there from the Tatars attacking from east over all his land up til Zagreb. Crescent and star are ancient sybols used on the oldest coat of arms of Croatia (see the first arms in the crown of Croatian state's arms). The windows on the castle are of the type used for shooting from them, symbolizing, that tough open, it is ready for defence if necesery.

The flag is used in few variations, without the determined proportions, most often they are 1:2. It is much more often to see it with the arms rotated 90 degrees, and hanged verically, and sometimes there is no white outline of the shield of arms.

In socialist years, the flag was used with a red star over the shield, or in the upper hoist position. Of course, the star was removed in 1990.

zeljko heimer 18-MAR-1996

County of Zagreb

by zeljko heimer

On 16-MAR-1996 the county of Zagreb addopted new flag, at least it was today printed in newspapers, and shown on TV news. The flag is barry of 5 green and white (i.e. g-w-g-w-g), with the coat of arms of county (also addopted today) in the middle. The coat of arms is 'military shaped' (that what they told on TV, I think it is German type) quatered with escutcheon yellow with rock brown from wich there is a source of water falling in a well made of stones. First field is blue with yellow crowned lion's (panther's) head. Second is checquy red and white. Third in blue black marten passant on a green ground. Fourth barry of 5 green and white.

This coat of arms is said to be based on the old coat of arms of county of Zagreb from 18th century (I don't know what it was, so I don't know how much it is similar [added latter: a very similar design is found on 18th century flag of County of Zagreb, that is preserved in Croatian Historical Museum]). It is easily recognized that three of the four fields represents three main Croatian regions i.e. kingdoms of Croatia, Dalmatia and Slavonia. The coats here are not represented in full, but are modified a bit - there is just one head in Dalmatian, and there is no rivers and star in Slavonian. The fourth is said to be a coat of arms of Turopolje, region south of Zagreb (and was used as a base for the flag). Escutcheon is explained on TV, as to represent a source that was once in the Zagreb's midpoint - called Mandusevac, and with which the legend of naming the city is connected. There is still a fountain in the Zagreb's main square in this place.

One should differenciate a county of Zagreb (Zagrebacka zupanija) with the city of Zagreb. The first is including the second, and moreover several smaller twons in surrounding. (to confuze things further, there was County of City of Zagreb (Zupanija Grad Zagreb) that was merged with Couty of Zagreb).

This is not the first county to accept a flag, but I have no good confirmations on some others. I will just say that it seems that the county of Split and Dalmatia (Splitsko-Dalmatinska zupanija - most of counties have such a double names, naming a city and a whider region) addopted a yellow-blue flag, devided vertically in proportionn Makea's (of Rarotonga) personal standard.
stuart park 21-FEB-1996

1850-1888: Uses horizontally red-white-red with 3 stars in blue (the one we
           have been talking about so far), at that time R. seems to have
           been an independent entity (?).
1888-1893: A British protecto