page_title: Flag of Poland
section_title: Twentieth century
hierarchical_section_title: Flag of Poland / History / Twentieth century
caption_attribution_description: English: Polish flag in Berlin 02.05.1945 over the Berlin Victory Column (Siegessäule) when Red Army and Polish Army after fierce fights against Nazis together conquered Berlin that was the seat of criminal Nazi regime in Germany. Visible building of Schloss Bellevue. Polski: Polska flaga w Berlinie 2 maja 1945 roku na Kolumnie Zwycięstwa. Armia Czerwona i Ludowe Wojsko Polskie razem zdobyły Berlin po ciężkich walkach z niemieckimi nazistami. Widoczny Zamek Bellevue.
context_page_description: The flag of Poland consists of two horizontal stripes of equal width, the upper one white and the lower one red. The two colours are defined in the Polish constitution as the national colours. A variant of the flag with the national coat of arms in the middle of the white stripe is legally reserved for official use abroad and at sea. A similar flag with the addition of a swallow-tail is used as the naval ensign of Poland.
  White and red were officially adopted as national colours in 1831, although these were associated with Poland since the Middle Ages and were emphasized on royal banners. They are of heraldic origin and derive from the tinctures of the coats of arms of the two constituent nations of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, i.e. the White Eagle of Poland and the Pursuer of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, a white knight riding a white horse, both on a red shield. Prior to that, Polish soldiers wore cockades of various color combinations. The national flag was officially adopted in 1919. Since 2004, Polish Flag Day is celebrated on 2 May.
  The flag is flown continuously on the buildings of the highest national authorities, such as the parliament and the presidential palace.
context_section_description: White-and-red flags were first waved during a patriotic demonstration on 3 May 1916 in Warsaw. The organizing committee advised participants about the correct alignment of the colors, that is with the white stripe above the red one. Still, many demonstrators brought flags with the red stripe on top. On 1 August 1919, almost a year after Poland regained independence in November 1918, the Sejm officially introduced a white-and-red bicolor as the Polish national flag. In order to avoid confusion with the white-and-red maritime signal flag used internationally by harbor pilots and tugboats, the same act of Sejm introduced a variant of the flag with the coat of arms in the white stripe for use as a civil ensign and by Polish diplomats and consuls abroad.
  Apart from changes in the legal specifications of the shades of the national colors (see the section below), the basic design of the Polish flag, including the 5:8 ratio, has remained unchanged to this day. The flag with coat of arms was only modified to adjust to the changes in the coat of arms itself. Major modifications included a change in the stylization of the eagle from Classicist to Baroque in 1927 and the removal of the crown from the eagle's head during the Communist rule from 1944 to 1990. In that period, Poland was one of the few socialist states in the Eastern Bloc (apart from the Flag of Cuba) not to adorn communist symbolism on its flag.
  20th-century Polish insurgents wore white-and-red brassards (armbands) which played a role similar to the cockade of previous centuries. Such armbands were worn by Polish freedom fighters during the Greater Poland Uprising (1918–1919) and Silesian Uprisings (1919–1921), as well as during the Second World War (1939–1945) by the soldiers of the Home Army (AK) and Peasants' Battalions (BCh) – usually emblazoned with the acronyms of their formations. During the Second World War, Polish soldiers raised the Polish flag on several sites of their victories. On 18 May 1944, after an Allied victory over the German forces in the Battle of Monte Cassino, a patrol of the 12th Podolian Uhlan Regiment (part of the Polish 3rd Carpathian Rifle Division) raised a Polish flag on ruins of the Monte Cassino abbey in Italy. On 1 August 1944, the first day of the Warsaw Uprising, a white-and-red flag was hoisted on the Prudential building, Warsaw's tallest skyscraper of the time. During the liberation of Warsaw by Soviet forces and Polish People's Army on 17 January 1945, Polish flags were raised on the Belvedere palace and ruins of the Main Railway Station. On 2 May 1945, after the capture of Berlin, soldiers of the 7th Battery, 3rd Division, 1st Light Artillery Regiment planted Polish flags on the Berlin Victory Column.
  Polish flags were also used by anti-government demonstrators under the Communist rule. During the bloody riots of 1956 in Poznań and 1970 in Gdynia, protesters carried flags that were blood-stained on the white stripe.
caption: Polish flag in Berlin on 2 May 1945
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