The national flag of Argentina dates from 1812. It is composed of three equal horizontal bands coloured light blue, white and light blue. On 1818 the yellow Sun that is located in the center was added.

The full flag featuring the Sun is called the Official Ceremony Flag (spanish Bandera Oficial de Ceremonia). The flag which doesn't feature the Sun is considered an Ornamental Flag (spanish Bandera de Ornato). An ornamental version should always be hoisted below the Official Ceremony Flag. In vexillological terms, the Official Ceremony Flag is the civil, state and war flag and ensign, whilst the Ornamental Flag is an alternate civil flag and ensign.

Is important to note that both versions are equally considered the national flag.

Contents

1 History 1.1 Creation 1.2 Changes 2 Official shape and size 3 Official colours 4 The sun 5 Stories 6 External link

History

Creation

During Argentina's independence wars, while commanding in battle in Rosario, Lawyer Manuel Belgrano noticed that both the Crown's forces and the independence forces were using the same colors (Spain's yellow and red). After realizing that, he created a flag using the colors that were used by the criollo during the May Revolution in 1810.

Excited by the fact of having a national flag, Belgrano dispatched a letter addressed to the First Junta, informing them of the newly created flag. The Junta, fearing the Spanish Crown, sent a warn to Belgrano not to fight under the flag but by the time the reply had arrived, Belgrano had already left the place, thus the flag could be seen on the battlefield.

The flag was hoisted for the first time in Buenos Aires on the Saint Nicholas of Bari church on August 23, 1812 (where nowadays the obelisk is located).

After the independence declaration on July 9, 1816, the flag was adopted as a symbol by the Congress.

Changes

On February 25, 1818, a sun was added as a distinctive for the battle flag. The sun was copied after the one that the first Argentine coin featured on 1813. The sun was decided to be part of the regular flag afterwards, thus the sun no longer represents war.

On June 8, 1938, president Roberto Ortiz sanctioned a law declaring June 20 Flag Day and national holiday (the date was decided after Belgrano's death anniversary).

On 1978 it's decided that the Official Ceremony Flag should have 1.4 meters of width and 0.9 meters of height, and that the sun must be embroidered, among other measurements.

Official shape and size

Its official proportions are 9:14, and its official size is 0.9 by 1.4 metres. It features three stripes alternating cerulean blue - white - cerulean blue. Each stripe is 30 centimetres in height. In the center stripe there is an emblem known as Sun of May (spanish Sol de Mayo), a golden rising sun. Flags in proportions of 1:2 and 2:3 are also in use.

Official colours

The colours are subject to discussion, and there's no official position over colour usage. The Spanish word celeste (cerulean blue) is used to describe the colour. Cerulean blue's Pantone is defined as N21-01, which equals 155, 196, 226 in RGB notation.

Colour	RGB	HTML	HSV	Lab	CMYK	Sample
Cerulean Blue	156, 196, 226	#9BC4E2	201, 31, 89	77, -9, -20	37, 12, 3, 0
Cerulean Blue (Websafe)	153, 205, 255	#99CCFF	210, 40, 100	80, -3, -31	35, 10, 0, 0
White	255, 255, 255	#FFFFFF	0, 0, 100	100, 0, 0	0, 0, 0, 0
Golden Yellow	255, 205, 51	#FFCD33	45, 80, 100	85, 8, 76	1, 19, 89, 0
Black	0, 0, 0	#000000	0, 0, 0	0, 0, 0	75, 68, 67, 90

The sun

The sun is replic from the first Argentine coin approved in 1813 which value was a eight escudos (one Spanish dollar).

On 1978 the sun colour was decided to be golden yellow (Amarillo oro), have an inner ten centimeters diameter, and an outer one of twenty five centimeters (The diameter of the sun equals <math>5/6th<math> the height of the white stripe. The sun's face is <math>2/5th<math> of its height)

It features 32 rays of light/flames, 16 undulated and 16 straight, which are alternated.

In the Official Ceremony Flag, the sun must be embroidered.

Stories

The most accepted version is that the flag colors are after the sky, clouds and sun, however there are several folk stories about the colors of the flag. One story says that the blue symbolizes the R�o de la Plata (River Plate) and the white symbolizes silver (Argentina comes from the Latin word for silver, Argentum). Another story states that they are the colors of the sky, with white for the clouds. Yet a third story states that the colors were chosen based on those of the House of Bourbon, and a fourth is that the colors are derived from the clothing of the Virgin Mary.

Whether Belgrano created it or not is unknown but, during the independence wars against Spain, he was the first one to use it, even though the criollo government didn't approve it.

Another popular belief is that the sun version is a war flag while the sun-less one is not, this was true after the Congress approval in 1818 but it was changed afterwards.

External link

More information (in Spanish) (http://www.portalargentino.net/simbolos/bandera.htm)

National flags

List of national flags | Gallery of national flags

List of national coats of arms

ca:Bandera de l'Argentina de:Flagge Argentiniens es:Bandera de Argentina fr:Drapeau de l'Argentine it:Bandiera Argentina he:דגל ארגנטינה ja:アルゼンチンの国旗 pt:Bandeira da Argentina sv:Argentinas flagga