The flag of Europe or European flag consists of a navy blue flag with twelve golden stars in a circle. It was designed by a staff member, Arsène Heitz, and adopted in 1955 by the Council of Europe (CoE) as a symbol for the whole of Europe.
Since 1985, the flag has also been a symbol of the European Union (EU), whose 27 member states are all also CoE members, although in that year the EU had not yet assumed its present name or constitutional form (which came in steps in 1993 and 2009). Adoption by the EU, or EC as it then was, reflected a long-standing CoE desire to see the flag used by other European organisations. Official EU use widened greatly in the 1990s. Nevertheless, the flag has to date received no status in any of the EU's treaties. Its adoption as an official symbol was planned as part of the 2004 Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe but this failed to be ratified. Mention of the flag was removed in 2007 from the text of the Treaty of Lisbon, which was ratified. On the other hand, 16 EU members that year, plus France in 2017, have officially affirmed (by Declaration No. 5224) their attachment to the flag as an EU symbol.
The flag is used by other European entities, such as unified golf teams under the rubric Team Europe, and the logo for Creative Europe Media.
Design Specifications
According to graphical specifications published online by the Council of Europe in 2004, the flag is rectangular with 2:3 proportions: its fly (width) is one and a half times the length of its hoist (height). Twelve yellow stars are centred in a circle (the radius of which is a third of the length of the hoist) upon a blue background. All the stars are upright (one point straight up), have five points and are spaced equally, like the hour positions on the face of a clock. The diameter of each star is equal to one-ninth of the height of the hoist. "PANTONE REFLEX BLUE corresponds in the web-palette colour RGB:0/0/153 (hexadecimal: 000099) and PANTONE YELLOW corresponds in the web-palette colour RGB:255/204/0 (hexadecimal: FFCC00)."
The colours are regulated in the 1996 guide by the EC, Guide graphique relatif à l'emblème européen (1996), p. 3: Description symbolique: Sur le fond bleu du ciel, les étoiles figurant les peuples d'Europe forment un cercle en signe d'union. Elles sont au nombre invariable de douze, symbole de la perfection et de la plénitude...Description héraldique: Sur fond azur, un cercle composé de douze étoiles d'or à cinq rais, dont les pointes ne se touchent pas. cf. and equivalently in the 2004 guide by the Council of Europe. The base colour of the flag is defined as Pantone "Reflex Blue", while the golden stars are portrayed in Pantone "Yellow":
Azure Gold Pantone Reflex Blue Yellow HEX #003399The 1996 guideline does not include any recommendation for RGB values. The 2004 guideline published online by the CoE recommends "RGB:0/51/153 (hexadecimal: 003399)" for "PANTONE REFLEX BLUE" and "RGB:255/204/0 (hexadecimal: FFCC00)" for "PANTONE YELLOW" for the web palette (the limited 12 bit color space popular at the time). These recommendations are by no means objective or universal. Other recommendations for "Reflex Blue" include: #0c1c8c (pantonecolors.org ) #001489 (pantone.com ) #00209F (colourlovers.com ) #001789 (e-paint.co.uk ) #171796 (encycolorpedia.com )
The former Pantone "Yellow" is now called "Yellow C", with recommended RGB value #FEDD00 (CMYK 0.1.100.0). (pantone.com) #FFCC00 CMYK 100.80.0.0 Guide graphique relatif à l'emblème européen (1996), p. 6: Le jaune est obtenu avec 100% de «Process Yellow». En mélangeant 100% de «Process Cyan» avec 80% de «Process Magenta», on obtient un bleu très semblable au Reflex Blue Pantone. 0.21.100.0
The 2013 logo of the Council of Europe has the colours:Council of Europe's new visual identity- Guide , Council of EUrope, 2013. Azure Gold Pantone PMS 287RGB and CMYK values are those given in the 2013 recommendation. Pantone recommendations for PMS 287: RGB #003087, CMYK 100.75.2.18 (pantone.com ); for PMS 116: RGB #FFCD00, CMYK 0.14.100.0 (pantone.com ). PMS 116 HEX #1E448A #FDCB0B CMYK 100.67.0.40 0.20.100.0
Blazon The blazon given by the EU in 1996 describes the design as: "On an azure field a circle of twelve golden mullets, their points not touching."
Symbolism The flag used is the Flag of Europe, which consists of a circle of twelve golden stars on a blue background. Originally designed in 1955 for the Council of Europe, the flag was adopted by the European Communities, the predecessors of the present European Union, in 1986. The Council of Europe gave the flag a symbolic description in the following terms, though the official symbolic description adopted by the EU omits the reference to the "Western world":
Other symbolic interpretations have been offered based on the account of its design by Paul M. Levy. The five-pointed star is used on many national flags and represents aspiration and education. Their golden colour is that of the sun, which is said to symbolise glory and enlightenment.
Their arrangement in a circle represents the constellation of Corona Borealis and can be seen as a crown and the stability of government. The blue background resembles the sky and symbolises truth and the intellect. It is also the colour traditionally used to represent the Virgin Mary. In many paintings of the Virgin Mary as Stella Maris she is crowned with a circle of twelve stars.
Marian interpretation
In 1987, following the adoption of the flag by the EC, Arsène Heitz, one of the designers who had submitted proposals for the flag's design, suggested a religious inspiration for it. He stated that the circle of stars was based on the iconographic tradition of showing the Blessed Virgin Mary as the Woman of the Apocalypse, wearing a "crown of twelve stars".Carlo Curti Gialdino, I Simboli dell'Unione europea, Bandiera – Inno – Motto – Moneta – Giornata. Roma: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato S.p.A., 2005. , pp. 80–85. Gialdino is here cited after a translation of the Italian text published by the Centre Virtuel de la Connaissance sur l'Europe (cvce.eu ):
Irrespective of the statements by Paul M. G. Levy and the recent reconstruction by Susan Hood, crediting Arsène Heitz with the original design still seems to me the soundest option. In particular, Arsène Heitz himself, in 1987, laid claim to his own role in designing the flag and to its religious inspiration when he said that 'the flag of Europe is the flag of Our Lady' [Magnificat magazine, 1987].
Secondly, it is worth noting the testimony of Father Pierre Caillon, who refers to a meeting with Arsène Heitz. Caillon tells of having met the former Council of Europe employee by chance in August 1987 at Lisieux in front of the Carmelite monastery. It was Heitz who stopped him and declared "I was the one who designed the European flag. I suddenly had the idea of putting the 12 stars of the Miraculous Medal of the Rue du Bac on a blue field. My proposal was adopted unanimously on 8 December 1955, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. I am telling you this, Father, because you are wearing the little blue cross of the Blue Army of Our Lady of Fatima".
Heitz also made a connection to the date of the flag's adoption, 8 December 1955, coinciding with the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Paul M. G. Lévy, then Director of Information at the Council of Europe responsible for designing the flag, in a 1989 statement maintained that he had not been aware of any religious connotations. "While Count Coudenhove-Kalergi in a personal statement maintained that three leading Catholics within the Council had subconsciously chosen the twelve stars on the model of Apocalypse 12:1, Paul M.G. Lévy, Press Officer of the Council from 1949 to 1966, explained in 1989 that there was no religious intention whatsoever associated with the choice of the circle of twelve stars." Peter Diem, 11 June 2002.
In an interview given 26 February 1998, Lévy denied not only awareness of the Marian connection, but also denied that the final design of a circle of twelve stars was Heitz's. To the question "Who really designed the flag?" Lévy replied:
I did, and I calculated the proportions to be used for the geometric design. Arsène Heitz, who was an employee in the mail service, put in all sorts of proposals, including the 15-star design. But he submitted too many designs. He wanted to do the European currencies with 15 stars in the corner. He wanted to do national flags incorporating the Council of Europe flag.
Carlo Curti Gialdino (2005) has reconstructed the design process to the effect that Heitz's proposal contained varying numbers of stars, from which the version with twelve stars was chosen by the Committee of Ministers meeting at Deputy level in January 1955 as one out of two remaining candidate designs.
Lévy's 1998 interview apparently gave rise to a new variant of the Marian anecdote. An article published in in August 1998 alleged that it was Lévy himself who was inspired to introduce a Marian element as he walked past a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
An article posted in La Raison in February 2000 further connected the donation of a stained glass window for Strasbourg Cathedral by the Council of Europe on 21 October 1956. This window, a work by Parisian master Max Ingrand, shows a blessing Madonna underneath a circle of 12 stars on dark blue ground. The overall design of the Madonna is inspired by the banner of the cathedral's Congrégation Mariale des Hommes, and the twelve stars are found on the statue venerated by this congregation inside the cathedral (twelve is also the number of members of the congregation's council). The Regional Office for Cultural Affairs describe this stained glass window called "Le vitrail de l'Europe de Max Ingrand" (The Glass Window of Europe of Max Ingrand).
History and usage The twelve-star "flag of Europe" was designed in 1950 and officially adopted by the Council of Europe in 1955. The same flag was adopted by the European Parliament in 1983. The European Council adopted it as an "emblem" for the European Communities in 1985. Its status in the European Communities was inherited by the European Union upon its formation in 1993. The proposal to adopt it as official flag of the European Union failed with the ratification of the European Constitution in 2005, and mention of all emblems suggesting statehood was removed from the Treaty of Lisbon of 2007, although sixteen member states signed a declaration supporting the continued use of the flag.Final Act, Official Journal of the European Union, 2007 C 306–2, p. 267 Declaration 52, consolidated EU treaties. In 2007, the European Parliament officially adopted the flag for its own use. The proposal was passed on 8 October 2008 by 503 votes to 96 (15 abstentions).
Pan-European flags before 1950
1950–present: Council of Europe The Council of Europe in 1950 appointed a committee to study the question of adopting a symbol. Numerous proposals were looked into.
Among the unsuccessful proposals was the flag of Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi's International Paneuropean Union, which he had himself recently adopted for the European Parliamentary Union. Letter to the secretary general of the Council of Europe from Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi , Council of Europe. The design was a blue field with a red cross inside an orange circle at the centre.