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The single-coloured black flag


Flagge, Fahne, einfarbig, einfarbige, flag, plain, monochrome, single, coloured, colored, schwarz, black


Single-coloured black flags were emblems of the following states: Khwarezm (Khiva), Pahang, Lingga, Afghanistan

Single-coloured black flags have a long tradition and have been relatively common, especially in South East Asia, as the colour of the flags of the once powerful Sultanate of Lingga and the states that depend on it. It is considered one of the colors of Islam. The origin of the black flag is said to go back directly to the Prophet Mohammed, who is said to have used two flags, an unlabeled white flag and an unlabelled black flag. Black also stands for the Abbasids, a caliph dynasty that goes back to the caliph Abbas I. The black bunting also stands for tawheed, the belief in the unity and uniqueness of God, and for the jihad. In the hadiths (traditions of the sayings and actions of the Prophet Mohammed) it is stated that the arrival of the Mahdi will be signaled by black banners.

Single-colured black flags can have very different meanings that go far beyond the topic of state or national flags:

• Warning signal: Caution! Danger of death! E.g. when the plague breaks out.

• Warning signal: Requisition from pirates to a ship to immediately raise the flag, otherwise there will be no mercy in the case of the capture.

• Similar to the war on land: In the American Civil War, 1861-1865, the "Black Flag Brigade", the Missouri Partisan Rangers, a pro-Confederate guerrilla under William C. Quantrill, used the black flag as a symbol of their mercilessness. There was a variant that showed a white "Q" in the upper corner.

• Mourning color: Expression of mourning for the loss of a person, but also mourning because of an unbearable, unacceptable occurrence (as in 1966 when the collieries were closed on the Ruhr River). Another example: On 4th of March in 1919 the winners of the First World War determined that the Sudetenland had to be part of Czechoslovakia. Out of mourning over this, the lower golden stripe of a black, red and golden flag was replaced by a black stripe.

• Protest color: As an expression of political protest and resistance (1929, Claus Heim, uprising of the rural people's movement - at first only the plain black flag without symbols was used as the (supposed) flag of the German Peasants' War.

• Political color: the anarchists still use the black flag worldwide as an expression of their political will ("No power for nobody"). But not exclusively. A red-black diagonally divided flag was and is also used. Typical symbols can be shown on the black as well as the red-black flag, such as the clenched fist, the "A" in a circle, a five-pointed star.

• From 1936 onwards, two militias stood up against each other as part of the armed forces of the government and the insurgent putschists, both with black and red flags: On the side of the government the anarchist militia of the FAI (Federation of Iberian Anarchists) and the anarcho-syndicalist CNT (trade union federation) with the red and black diagonally divided flag and on the side of the insurgents, the Falange Espanola de las JONS (Phalanx of the Councils of the National-Syndicalist Offensive). They used a red-black-red flag with vertical stripes, which showed in the middle of the black field in red the yoke and the arrows of the Catholic kings of Spain.

Flagge, fahne, flag, FAI, CNTFlagge, fahne, flag, Falange

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Source: Jürgen Kaltschmitt, partially Volker Preuß, nach:

Bibliography by Jürgen Kaltschmitt:

– T.Wise/G.Rosignoli, Flaggen und Standarten 1618-1900, München 1978
– R.Brzezinski/R.Hook, Die Armee Gustav Adolfs-Infanterie und Kavallerie, Königswinter, 2006
– R.Chartrand, Colonial American Troops 1610-1774 (3), Oxford 2002

about the yellow hospital flag and red ambulance flag:
– R. Hodges Jr/ P.Dennis, American Civil War Railroad Tactics, Oxford 2009
– P. Katcher/R.Scollins, Flags of the American Civil War (2) Union, London 1993
– P. Katcher/M.Youens, The Army of Northern Virginia, London 1975

about the red and black flags of the anarcho-syndicalists and the national-syndicalists:
– J.M. Bueno, Uniformes Militares de la Guerra Civil Espanola en Color, Madrid 1971

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