Flags of All Nations (c. 1899) - encyclopaediae.org

About

Flags of All Nations is a colour-printed sheet of fifty-two flags of nations and states, as an American publisher understood them at the close of the nineteenth century. It carries the page numeral 8 and was plainly issued as a leaf of some larger atlas or reference work, which has not yet been identified.

This page catalogues the sheet as a historical source. Printed captions are transcribed as printed, with the sheet's italic capitals normalized to mixed case; a modern identification follows each transcription in italics. The printed captions do not by themselves establish that every depicted design was official, current, or colour-accurate at the time of publication — several demonstrably were not (see Method and Next Stage).

Source Catalogue

Complete sheet titled Flags of All Nations, showing 52 flags in nine rows within a star-spangled blue border — Complete sheet, reduced for display. Select the image to open the full 600 dpi source scan (about 78 MB).

Printed title	Flags of All Nations, lettered on a drawn ribbon banner at the head of the sheet. The page numeral 8 is printed below the border.
Collection date	c. 1899 (assigned). No date is printed on the sheet. Internal evidence brackets it to about 1896–1902 (see below).
Associated work	A larger atlas or reference work, indicated by the page numeral; the containing work has not yet been identified.
Publisher	Not stated on the sheet
Creator of plate	Not stated on the sheet
Language	English
Format	Colour-printed sheet within a blue border spangled with white stars; the exact production process has not yet been established
Physical extent	One printed leaf; approximately 27 × 36 cm, inferred from the 600 dpi scan. Dimensions of the physical sheet not yet measured directly.
Provenance	Not yet recorded
Contents	52 flag panels in nine rows. Three polities receive two variant panels each — Great Britain (standard and merchant), the German Empire (man of war and merchant), and Spain (standard and merchant) — giving 49 polities in all.
Digital surrogate	Complete sheet: JPEG, 6418 × 8419 pixels at 600 dpi, with a reduced 1100 × 1443 JPEG for display. Extracted panels: PNG (52), cropped from the 600 dpi scan.
Catalogue status	Preliminary. The containing work, publisher, provenance, and individual flag analysis remain subject to revision.

Editorial convention: Printed captions are retained because they are evidence of the source's terminology — Servia, Roumania, Santo Domingo, and Argentine are kept as printed. Modern identification and analysis are supplied separately, without silently replacing the printed labels.

Internal Dating Evidence

The canton of the United States flag contains 45 stars in rows of 8–7–8–7–8–7. The 45-star flag became official on 4 July 1896, after the admission of Utah, and remained current until the 46th star was added in 1908. The sheet therefore cannot have been prepared before 1896.

The South African Republic and the Orange Free State appear as independent states. Britain annexed both Boer republics in 1900, in the course of the war of 1899–1902. Cuba receives a full-width panel as prominent as the one given to the United States, though the Cuban republic was not proclaimed until 1902; the presentation fits American sympathy for the Cuban cause around the war of 1898. The Congo Free State (1885–1908) and the separate Hawaii panel point to the same interval. Together these bracket the sheet to about 1896–1902 and support the assigned date of c. 1899.

Several panels reproduce designs that had been obsolete well before 1896: the imperial flag of Brazil, superseded in 1889; the seven-star flag of Ecuador, superseded in 1860; the banded flag of Guatemala, superseded in 1871. These date the publisher's models, not the sheet.

Index of Flag Panels

The sheet contains 52 panels, one flag drawing in each, arranged in nine rows and read left to right and top to bottom. The first row gives full-width panels to the United States and Cuba, with the two Great Britain panels between them beneath the title banner. Where the source prints a variant designation in parentheses, it is given on a second line. Select any image to open the full-resolution extraction from the 600 dpi scan.

United States flag with a 45-star canton, as printed on the sheet — United StatesUnited States — 45-star flag, pattern of 1896–1908

Quartered royal standard labelled Great Britain, Standard — Great BritainStandardUnited Kingdom — royal standard

Red ensign with Union Jack canton, labelled Great Britain, Merchant — Great BritainMerchantUnited Kingdom — merchant red ensign

Cuban flag with star on red triangle and blue and white stripes, as printed on the sheet — CubaCuba — independence flag; the republic was proclaimed in 1902

German imperial war ensign with black cross and eagle, labelled German Empire, Man of War — German EmpireMan of WarGerman Empire — imperial war ensign

Black, white, and red horizontal tricolour labelled German Empire, Merchant — German EmpireMerchantGerman Empire — merchant tricolour

French tricolour as printed on the sheet — FranceFrench Republic — tricolour

Blue and white Portuguese flag with crowned arms, as printed on the sheet — PortugalKingdom of Portugal — crowned arms on blue and white

Spanish royal standard with quartered arms, labelled Spain, Standard — SpainStandardKingdom of Spain — the quartered chart-tradition standardFlag page →

Red and yellow striped Spanish merchant flag, labelled Spain, Merchant — SpainMerchantKingdom of Spain — merchant ensign

Yellow flag with black double-headed eagle and decorated border, labelled Austria-Hungary — Austria-HungaryAustria-Hungary — imperial standard, black double eagle on yellow

Belgian vertical tricolour with arms, as printed on the sheet — BelgiumKingdom of Belgium — tricolour charged with arms

Danish swallow-tailed ensign with white cross and royal arms, as printed on the sheet — DenmarkDenmark — swallow-tailed state ensign with royal arms

Italian tricolour with crowned shield of Savoy, as printed on the sheet — ItalyKingdom of Italy — tricolour with crowned arms of Savoy

Blue flag with white cross bearing a crown, labelled Greece — GreeceKingdom of Greece — white cross on blue, charged with a crown

Red, white, and blue horizontal tricolour labelled Netherlands — NetherlandsNetherlands — red-white-blue tricolour

Yellow flag with black double-headed eagle, labelled Russia — RussiaRussian Empire — imperial standard, black double eagle on yellow

Swedish triple-tailed ensign with yellow cross, union mark, and arms, as printed on the sheet — SwedenSweden — war ensign with the union mark of Sweden–Norway

Norwegian triple-tailed ensign with blue and white cross, union mark, and arms, as printed on the sheet — NorwayNorway — war ensign with the union mark of Sweden–Norway

White cross on red, labelled Switzerland — SwitzerlandSwitzerland — white cross on red

Red flag with white crescent and star, labelled Turkey — TurkeyOttoman Empire — crescent and star on red

Red, white, and blue flag with small central arms, labelled Servia — ServiaKingdom of Serbia

Mexican tricolour with eagle, as printed on the sheet — MexicoMexico — tricolour with the eagle

Banded flag of blue, white, red, and yellow with oval emblem, labelled Guatemala — GuatemalaGuatemala — banded flag of the 1858 pattern, superseded 1871

Blue and white striped flag with starred red canton, labelled Salvador — SalvadorEl Salvador — striped flag with starred canton, used 1865–1912

Blue and white banded flag with central emblem, labelled Honduras — HondurasHonduras — blue and white bands with arms

Plain blue and white banded flag labelled Nicaragua — NicaraguaNicaragua — blue and white bands, without arms

Swallow-tailed banded flag with emblem, labelled Costa Rica — Costa RicaCosta Rica — swallow-tailed ensign with arms

Blue over red bicolour labelled Haiti — HaitiHaiti — blue over red

Blue over red flag with central white cross surrounded by stars, labelled Santo Domingo — Santo DomingoDominican Republic — depiction differs from the documented quartered flag

Blue and white banded flag with sun, labelled Argentine — ArgentineArgentine Republic — with the Sun of May

Red, yellow, and green banded flag with central arms, labelled Bolivia — BoliviaBolivia — tricolour with arms

Green flag with yellow lozenge and crowned imperial arms, labelled Brazil — BrazilBrazil — imperial flag, superseded by the republican flag in 1889

Chilean flag with white star on blue canton, as printed on the sheet — ChileChile

Yellow, blue, and red banded flag with oval starred emblem, labelled Colombia — ColombiaColombia — with oval starred emblem

White flag with central blue band bearing seven stars, labelled Ecuador — EcuadorEcuador — seven-star flag of 1845, superseded 1860

Red, white, and blue banded flag with central emblem, labelled Paraguay — ParaguayParaguay — tricolour with emblem

Red and white vertically banded flag with arms, labelled Peru — PeruPeru — with arms

Striped flag with sun in canton, labelled Uruguay — UruguayUruguay — sun and stripes

Yellow, blue, and red banded flag with small emblem, labelled Venezuela — VenezuelaVenezuela — tricolour with arms

Striped flag with Union Jack canton, labelled Hawaii — HawaiiHawaii — annexed by the United States in 1898Polity page →

Yellow flag with black dragon, labelled China — ChinaQing China — imperial dragon flag

White flag with red sun disc, labelled Japan — JapanJapan — sun disc

White flag with taeguk disc and trigrams, labelled Korea — KoreaKorea — taegukgi; the Korean Empire was proclaimed in 1897

Green-bordered pennant with devices, labelled Persia — PersiaQajar Persia

Red flag with white elephant, labelled Siam — SiamSiam — white elephant on red; modern Thailand

Striped flag with white star on blue canton, labelled Liberia — LiberiaLiberia — lone star and stripes

Red flag with white triangular border and crossed scissor-like device, labelled Morocco — MoroccoMorocco — with the crossed “scissors” device of European flag charts

Striped flag with Dutch tricolour canton, labelled Orange Free State — Orange Free StateOrange Free State — Boer republic, annexed by Britain in 1900

Red, white, and blue flag with green hoist band, labelled South African Republic — South African RepublicSouth African Republic (Transvaal) — Vierkleur; annexed by Britain in 1900

Blue flag with yellow star, labelled Congo Free State — Congo Free StateCongo Free State — gold star on blue, 1885–1908

Blue, yellow, and red vertical tricolour labelled Roumania — RoumaniaKingdom of Romania — vertical tricolour

Method and Next Stage

The index above records what is on the sheet before interpreting any of it. Study pages can then set each depiction against documented flag history and account for differences in colour, proportion, geometry, or status.

What stands out about this sheet is how unevenly current its models were. The United States canton is exactly up to date, 45 stars official from 1896. Yet Brazil appears under the imperial flag a decade after the republic replaced it, Ecuador under a flag discarded in 1860, and Guatemala under a pattern superseded in 1871. The Santo Domingo panel matches no documented Dominican flag. The Morocco panel repeats the crossed “scissors” device that European and American charts had been copying from one another since the eighteenth century. Each of these deserves a study separating what the publisher had to hand from what was actually being flown.

The Hawaii panel joins the depictions collected on the Hawaii (Sandwich Islands) polity page, which places printed source evidence beside the documented history of the flag.

Bibliographic References

Flags of All Nations, complete sheet in the present collection; title and captions transcribed from the sheet.