A black double-headed eagle on a red field: the symbol of the medieval hero Skanderbeg that Albania has carried on all of its flags.
Every fact about the flag, each with what it means.
Normal flagFIAV symbol: the form of the flag.
Civil, state and militaryFIAV symbol: who may fly the flag.YesIt carries the coat of arms on the cloth.The flag in the words of vexillology and heraldry.
It is a rectangular field with a 5:7 ratio, red, with a black double-headed eagle in the centre and no other figures. The 2002 Albanian law defines it like this:
Each element and how many of the 1,390 flags in the catalogue carry it. In yellow, the rarest.
How it was born, how it has changed and what it means.
The flag of Albania is a red field with a black double-headed eagle in the centre. The recorded date of adoption is a triple one: 1443, 1912 and 1992.
The symbol comes from Gjergj Kastriot, Skanderbeg, a 15th-century Albanian who led the revolt against the Ottoman Empire and who won a brief independence for Albania between 1443 and 1478. He adopted the seal and flag of the Byzantine Empire, hence the two-headed eagle on a red field.
The flag has always been described as dark red or blood red, with a black double-headed eagle.
It has three dates of adoption, corresponding to three different moments: 1443, Skanderbeg’s seal; 1912, the independence after the First World War; and 7 April 1992, the flag of the current state after the fall of the communist regime.
Red
the colour of the field, described as dark red or blood red.
Double-headed eagle
black, in the centre. It is a Byzantine emblem: it has two heads because the model is that of the Eastern Roman Empire.
1443, 1912 and 1992. These are not contradictions: they are three different states of the same banner. The first is the seal of the leader who freed the country, the second is the independence of 1912, the third is the current state.
Skanderbeg did not invent the emblem: he took the one of the Byzantine Empire. That is the reason for the two heads. It is a case of inherited power: the Albanian flag is, in origin, a Byzantine banner by a medieval route.
The description insists on the tone: dark red, ‘blood’ red. It is not the vivid red of other national flags, but the deep red of ancient cloths and medieval seals.
Where it is and what borders it.
Test what you have read about the flag of Albania.
Text based on the article “Bandera de Albania” from the Spanish Wikipedia, published under the licence CC BY-SA 4.0.
Sources consulted:
Flag image: Sadik Kaceli, Wikimedia Commons · Public domain.
Other flag
Asia
Other flag
Europa
Other flag
Europa
Other flag
Europa
Other flag
Asia
Other flag
Asia
Montenegro
Greece
North Macedonia
Kosovo