A white kanji imitating the Noto peninsula on a blue ground: in Ishikawa the flag itself does the job of the coat of arms of the prefecture.
Every fact about the flag, each with what it means.
Normal flagFIAV symbol: the form of the flag.
CivilFIAV 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 of a single colour, blue, with a single white drawing that takes up almost the whole cloth.
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 Ishikawa is a white kanji on a blue field: the characters of its name, 石川, so well stretched that they imitate the Noto peninsula, the tongue of land the prefecture pushes out into the Sea of Japan. And it is a rarity: in Ishikawa the flag does the job of a coat of arms.
It was established by regulation on 1 October 1972. The official explanation says that the design draws the kanji of the name in the shape of the Noto peninsula, and that the blue represents the Sea of Japan and the nature rich in clean water and pure air which the prefecture enjoys.
It has not changed since 1972.
Kanji 石川 (white)
the characters of Ishikawa turned into the silhouette of the Noto peninsula (official interpretation).
Blue
the Sea of Japan, the lush nature, the clean water and the pure air (official interpretation of the prefecture).
Ishikawa is the only Japanese prefecture with no emblem approved by its own rule: the design of the flag is used as an emblem —called the flag mark— since 1976 by a usage regulation.
Its field does not measure two by three, like almost all Japanese flags, but 31 by 44, a ratio fixed in the regulation.
As an emblem the colours are not fixed: it is usually drawn in blue, like the flag, or in gold.
Test what you have read about the flag of Ishikawa.
Sources consulted:
Flag image: Kzaral, Wikimedia Commons · Public domain.
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