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Tunisian Historical Ensigns (Galleys and Galiote)

Last modified: 2015-07-28 by rob raeside
Keywords: tunisia | africa | crescent | ottoman empire |
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Franciae Vexilla (#15/61, September 1999) has a colour plate showing flags displayed as real flags or drawings in the Museum of Tunis. Tunisia was nominally under Ottoman rule from 1574 to 1881 (French military intervention).

The captions are by Jean Renault. I suppose he copied them in the museum, therefore some look weird (especially those including "Ottoman period", knowing that all of these ensigns were used during Ottoman period.)

Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999


Commander of the galleys

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Commander of the galleys. Red swallow-tailed field with a blue border except along the hoist and three yellow crescents facing the fly, closely side by side. 1:2.

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Commander of the galleys (Ottoman period). Trapezoidal swallow-tailed red field with a blue border except along the hoist and three golden crescents facing the hoist, side by side, of decreasing size from hoist to fly.1:2.

Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Galley Ensigns

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Galley ensign. White swallow-tailed field with three red crescents facing the fly, side by side. 1:2.

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Galley ensign (?). As the first  one, but with five crescents (2 + 3) of smaller size. 1:2.

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Galley ensign. As the first one but with steeper tails and three crescents (3 + 3). 1:2.

Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Galiote Ensigns

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

"Tongue-like" blue field with three white crescents facing the fly (2 + 1). 2:3.

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

As the first one, but rectangular and with smaller crescents. 2:3.

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Horizontal blue-red with a white crescent facing the fly in the middle. 2:3.

by Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999

Horizontal blue-red-blue. 2:3.

Ivan Sache, 06 October 1999


All these flags with crescents remind us that somebody asked recently how to name crescents "looking" towards top, hoist, fly etc. In naming crescents we might use heraldic nomenclature. In this case, a plain "crescent" is only the one "looking" up, see: http://www.heraldica.org/shell/illustr.pl?255. One looking dexter, or in flag terms to the hoist, would be a "crescent increscent" or, more simply, an "increscent". One looking sinister, to the fly, would be a "crescent decrescent" or just a "decrescent". Finally, one upside down would be a "crescent reversed".

Santiago Dotor, 08 October 1999