St Patrick's blue is a name often mistakenly applied to several shades of blue associated with Ireland. The official colour of Ireland in heraldic terms is azure blue. The colour blue's association with Saint Patrick dates from the 1780s, when it was adopted as the colour of the Anglo-Irish Order of St Patrick . The term refers to a sky blue used by the Order of St Patrick, often confused in Ireland with a darker, rich blue. [1] [2] There is no de jure national colour in Ireland, with the only reference to any colour(s) appearing in Article 7 of the Irish Constitution in regards to the national flag. [3] However, while green is the de facto national colour of Ireland, representing Ireland in many sporting, cultural, and business events, azure blue is still found in symbols of both the state and the island. [4]
The first record of blue as representing authority in Ireland appears in the late 13th century French roll of arms, known as the Armorial Wijnbergen. Within the document, a shield bearing a gold harp on a Blue field with the inscription Le Roi d'Irlande ("king of Ireland") written underneath is listed [5] The Order of St Patrick was established in 1783 as the senior order of chivalry in the Kingdom of Ireland. The colour of its honours needed to differ from those of the Order of the Garter (dark blue) and the Order of the Thistle (green). Orange was considered, but the association with orangeism felt to be too sectarian, so the lighter blue was chosen. [6] Knights and officers of the order wore a "sky blue" mantle and riband, a hat lined with "blue", and a badge ringed with "blue" enamel. [7] The name St Patrick's blue was common but never officially used by the Order. [1] [8] The exact shade of blue used varied over time. A sky blue tinged with green was used by Lord Iveagh in 1895 and confirmed in 1903. [1]
There has been debate over the extent to which blue was a national colour of Ireland prior to the creation of the Order, and whether it was associated with Saint Patrick himself independently of the Order. Jim Smyth characterised the Order's adoption of St Patrick's Blue and Saint Patrick's Saltire as examples of invention of tradition. [9] Shane Leslie speculated that the green-blue of St Patrick's blue might be "but a reminiscence of the woad-stain used by all colour-loving Celts". [10] Constance Markievicz believed blue was "the old colour of Ireland" and incorporated it in the regalia of the Irish Citizen Army (ICA). [11] Scientific analysis of the ICA banner, the Starry Plough, found it had originally been a rich deep poplin field of blue before being replaced with green in advance of being flown over the Imperial Hotel during the 1916 Easter Rising. [12] [13] Antiquarian nationalist Francis Joseph Bigger considered St Patrick's blue a "fake colour" and Saint Patrick's Flag a "fake flag". [14] More recently, Peter Alter [15] and Christina Mahony [16] have supported the historicity of the colour, while Brian Ó Cuív questioned it. [4]
The Irish arms used by English monarchs since Edward IV had an azure field; originally the device was three crowns (now the arms of Munster) until Henry VIII changed it to a harp. This is still the arms of the modern Irish state, and also appears in the lower left quarter of the Royal Standard of the United Kingdom. [17] In Irish mythology, Flaitheas Éireann, the sovereignty of Ireland, was sometimes represented as a woman in a blue robe. [18] Although the arms of the province of Mide has a blue field, when its device was used as the arms of Ireland, the field was sable. [18] The Irish College in Paris, completed in 1776, [19] was renovated in 2002; the paint uncovered on the chapel walls was described as "St Patrick's blue" by a visiting journalist. [20] As regards green in association with Patrick: in 1681, Thomas Dineley reported people wearing crosses of green ribbon in their hats on Saint Patrick's Day. [21]
At a "National Ball" during Edward, Prince of Wales' 1868 visit to Ireland, his wife Alexandra wore a dress of "St Patrick blue". [22] In 1886, a garden party given by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland to showcase Irish manufacturing had an Irish-themed dress code. The Freeman's Journal criticised some of the code as difficult to comply with, but said 'Irish poplin ties of "St Patrick's Blue"—which we think looks rather green in a certain light—may [...] be had without much strain.' [23] The Guardian's report of the party stated 'the display of the new colour, "St. Patrick's Blue," was everywhere visible.' [24] The 1912 court uniform and dress code specified that the household of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland should wear St Patrick's blue, [25] as should Pages of Honour when the King was in Ireland. [26]
The Ireland association football team organised by the Irish Football Association (IFA) wore St Patrick's blue jerseys from 1882 until 1931, when they switched to green. [27] The IFA team is now the Northern Ireland team. The Football Association of Ireland sent an Irish Free State team to the 1924 Olympic football tournament; it wore a St Patrick's Blue change strip against Bulgaria, whose strip was Ireland's usual green. [28] In 2021, the Republic of Ireland wore a St. Patrick's Blue jersey in a friendly against Qatar for the 100th anniversary of the FAI. [29]
In the 1930s, the Army Comrades Association's Saint Patrick's blue shirts earned it the nickname of Blueshirts. It was a quasi-Fascist shirted movement which rejected green as associated with its republican opponents. [30] The saltire flag of the Blueshirts was a variant of Saint Patrick's Flag with the white background replaced with a blue background. W. T. Cosgrave described the colour as "in perfect, traditional, national accord with our history and in close association with the most revered and venerated memory of our patron Saint". [31]
The Irish Army Band's first uniform was St Patrick's blue, but this was soon changed to navy. [32] The Mounted Escort ceremonial cavalry of 1932–48 were nicknamed "Blue Hussars" from their uniforms, whose colour was sometimes described as St Patrick's blue. [33] [34] [35] The uniform introduced in 1970 for Aer Lingus air hostesses and ground crew [36] combined green and St Patrick's Blue, described in The Irish Times as "a sparkling new colour". [37] The 1970 uniform was replaced in 1975, after a design consultancy developed a common corporate image with a colour scheme of dark bottle green, bright green, and "a strong blue". [38]
The coat of arms of Ireland and the standard of the president of Ireland are a gold (or) Irish harp with silver (argent) strings on a field of blue (azure). [39] The standard was introduced at the end of Douglas Hyde's term in 1945; [40] contemporary news reports describe the blue as "St. Patrick's Blue". [41] The arms were granted by the Chief Herald of Ireland on 9 November 1945. [42] Horses owned by the Irish National Stud are regarded as owned by the president and entitled to run in the presidential colours. [43] The racing colours are "Saint Patrick's blue with gold sleeves, and a St Patrick's blue cap with gold tassel". [44] One such horse is Suailce, [45] which won the 2008 Irish Cesarewich. [46] The blue in the ribbon of the service medals of the Irish Defence Forces is described as "St. Patrick’s blue". [2] [47]
The official sporting colours of University College Dublin are "St. Patrick's Blue and Saffron", adopted in 1910. [48] The blue is commonly interpreted as 'light', 'Leinster or 'Dublin' blue; [48] the GAA county colours of County Dublin include light blue jerseys. In the National University of Ireland's academic dress code, "Saint Patrick's Blue" is the colour of the faculty of Science; Veterinary Medicine has a darker "Celtic Blue". [49] The academical dress of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland also features St Patrick's blue. [50] The Trinity College Dublin fencing club specifies that the azure in its colours is "St. Patrick's Blue (Pantone 295 as the Presedential [sic] Pennant)". [51]
Among Irish regiments of the British Army, a hackle of St Patrick's blue is worn in the bearskins of the Irish Guards [52] and in the caubeens of the London Irish Rifles. [53] The Guards' blue was chosen in distinction to the Royal Irish Fusiliers' green hackle. [54] St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin commemorates its historic association with the Order of Saint Patrick with St Patrick's blue on the cassocks of the choristers and under the clerical collars of the dean and the vicar. [55]
A cross-border flag for Ireland may be required where a sporting team combines athletes from both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The arms of the four provinces of Ireland on a background of Saint Patrick's blue has sometimes served this purpose. [56]
The Union Jack, or Union Flag, is the de facto national flag of the United Kingdom. Although no law has been passed making the Union Flag the official national flag of the United Kingdom, it has effectively become such through precedent. The Union Flag was also used as the official flag of several British colonies and dominions before they adopted their own national flags. The flag continues to have official status in Canada, by parliamentary resolution, where it is known as the Royal Union Flag.
The national flag of France is a tricolour featuring three vertical bands coloured blue, white, and red. It is known to English speakers as the Tricolour, although the flag of Ireland and others are also so known. The design was adopted after the French Revolution, where the revolutionaries were influenced by the horizontally striped red-white-blue flag of the Netherlands. While not the first tricolour, it became one of the most influential flags in history. The tricolour scheme was later adopted by many other nations in Europe and elsewhere, and, according to the Encyclopædia Britannica has historically stood "in symbolic opposition to the autocratic and clericalist royal standards of the past".
Orange is the colour between yellow and red on the spectrum of visible light. Human eyes perceive orange when observing light with a dominant wavelength between roughly 585 and 620 nanometres. In traditional colour theory, it is a secondary colour of pigments, produced by mixing yellow and red. In the RGB colour model, it is a tertiary colour. It is named after the fruit of the same name.
A shamrock is a type of clover, used as a symbol of Ireland. Saint Patrick, one of Ireland's patron saints, is said to have used it as a metaphor for the Christian Holy Trinity. The name shamrock comes from Irish seamróg, which is the diminutive of the Irish word seamair and simply means "young clover".
Saint Patrick's Day, or the Feast of Saint Patrick, is a religious and cultural holiday held on 17 March, the traditional death date of Saint Patrick, the foremost patron saint of Ireland.
The flag of Scotland is the national flag of Scotland, which consists of a white saltire defacing a blue field. The Saltire, rather than the Royal Standard of Scotland, is the correct flag for all private individuals and corporate bodies to fly. It is also, where possible, flown from Scottish Government buildings every day from 8:00 am until sunset, with certain exceptions.
The Most Illustrious Order of Saint Patrick is a dormant British order of chivalry associated with Ireland. The Order was created in 1783 by King George III at the request of the then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, The 3rd Earl Temple. The regular creation of knights of the Order lasted until 1922, when most of Ireland gained independence as the Irish Free State, a dominion within what was then known as the British Commonwealth of Nations. While the Order technically still exists, no knight of St Patrick has been created since 1936, and the last surviving knight, Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester, died in 1974. Charles III, however, remains the Sovereign of the Order, and one officer, the Ulster King of Arms, also survives. St Patrick is patron of the order; its motto is Quis separabit?, Latin for "Who will separate [us]?": an allusion to the Vulgate translation of Romans 8:35, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?"
Political colours are colours used to represent a political ideology, movement or party, either officially or unofficially. They represent the intersection of colour symbolism and political symbolism. Politicians making public appearances will often identify themselves by wearing rosettes, flowers, ties or ribbons in the colour of their political party. Parties in different countries with similar ideologies sometimes use similar colours. As an example the colour red symbolises left-wing ideologies in many countries, while the colour blue is often used for conservatism, the colour yellow is most commonly associated with liberalism and right-libertarianism, and Green politics is named after the ideology's political colour. The political associations of a given colour vary from country to country, and there are exceptions to the general trends, for example red has historically been associated with Christianity, but over time gained association with leftist politics, while the United States differs from other countries in that conservatism is associated with red and liberalism with blue. Mass media has driven a standardization of colour by political party, to simplify messaging, while historically the colour a candidate chose to identify with could have been chosen based on other factors such as family or regional variations.
In military organizations, the practice of carrying colours, standards, flags, or guidons, both to act as a rallying point for troops and to mark the location of the commander, is thought to have originated in Ancient Egypt some 5,000 years ago. The Roman Empire also made battle standards reading SPQR a part of their vast armies. It was formalized in the armies of Europe in the High Middle Ages, with standards being emblazoned with the commander's coat of arms.
The coat of arms of Ireland is blazoned as Azure a harp Or, stringed Argent. These arms have long been Ireland's heraldic emblem. References to them as being the arms of the king of Ireland can be found as early as the 13th century. These arms were adopted by Henry VIII of England when he ended the period of Lordship of Ireland and declared Ireland to be a kingdom again in 1541. When the crowns of England, Scotland and Ireland were united in 1603, they were integrated into the unified royal coat of arms of kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland. The harp was adopted as the emblem of the Irish Free State when it separated from the United Kingdom in 1922. They were registered as the arms of Ireland with the Chief Herald of Ireland on 9 November 1945.
In heraldry and vexillology, fimbriation is the placement of small stripes of contrasting colour around common charges or ordinaries, usually in order for them to stand out from the background, but often simply due to the designer's subjective aesthetic preferences, or for a more technical reason to avoid what would otherwise be a violation of the rule of tincture. While fimbriation almost invariably applies to both or all sides of a charge, there are very unusual examples of fimbriation on one side only. Another rather rare form is double fimbriation, where the charge or ordinary is accompanied by two stripes of colour instead of only one. In cases of double fimbriation the outer colour is blazoned first. The municipal flag of Mozirje, in Slovenia, show an example of fimbriation that itself is fimbriated.
Saint Patrick's Saltire or Saint Patrick's Cross is a red saltire on a white field. In heraldic language, it may be blazoned argent, a saltire gules. Saint Patrick's Flag is a flag composed of Saint Patrick's Saltire. The origin of the saltire is disputed. Its association with Saint Patrick dates from the 1780s, when the Anglo-Irish Order of Saint Patrick adopted it as an emblem. This was a British chivalric order established in 1783 by George III. It has been suggested that it derives from the arms of the powerful Geraldine or FitzGerald dynasty. Some Irish nationalists and others reject its use to represent Ireland as a "British invention" "for a people who had never used it".
The county colours of an Irish county are the colours of the kit worn by that county's representative team in the inter-county competitions of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA), the most important of which are the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship and the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship. Fans attending matches often wear replica jerseys, and wave flags and banners in the county colours. In the build-up to a major match, flags and bunting are flown or hung from cars, buildings, telegraph poles, and other fixtures across the county, especially in those regions where GAA support is strong.
There is no cross-border flag universally accepted as representing both jurisdictions on the island of Ireland. This can be a problem in contexts where a body organised on an all-island basis needs to be represented by a flag in an international context.
Varieties of the color blue may differ in hue, chroma, or lightness, or in two or three of these qualities. Variations in value are also called tints and shades, a tint being a blue or other hue mixed with white, a shade being mixed with black. A large selection of these colors are shown below.
The national flag of Ireland, frequently referred to in Ireland as 'the tricolour' and elsewhere as the Irish tricolour is a vertical tricolour of green, white and orange. The proportions of the flag are 1:2.
The national colours of Canada are red and white, the former being symbolic of England and the latter of France, the colours having been used representatively by those countries in the past. The maple is one of the national symbols and red is both the first leaf colour after spring budding and the autumn colour of maple leaves. The colours are most prominently evident on the national flag of Canada and it has been said they were declared the country's official colours when King George V proclaimed his Canadian coat of arms in 1921. However, there is no mention of national colours in the proclamation. Similarly, the creation of Queen Elizabeth II's royal standard in 1962 is also considered to be when red and white were unofficially set as the national colours.
The national colours of Italy are green, white, and red, collectively known in Italian as il Tricolore. The three Italian national colours appeared for the first time in Genoa on 21 August 1789 on the cockade of Italy shortly after the outbreak of the French Revolution, on 11 October 1796 they were used for the first time in Milan on a military banner, while on 7 January 1797 in Reggio Emilia they appeared for the first time on a flag.
The colour blue has been important in culture, politics, art and fashion since ancient times. Blue was used in ancient Egypt for jewellery and ornament. In the Renaissance, blue pigments were prized for paintings and fine blue and white porcelain. in the Middle Ages, deep rich blues made with cobalt were used in stained glass windows. In the 19th century, the colour was often used for military uniforms and fashion.
[Describing the ribbons of] the Service Medal, and the Reserve Defence Forces Service Medal, as "St. Patrick's blue" seems strange to British collectors, to whom the description means a very pale, slightly greenish blue, but perhaps the Irish attribute a rich dark blue to their patron saint.
The whole was contained in a very handsome walnut casket lined with Irish poplin of the shade known as St. Patrick's blue, which is the colour of the riband worn on the robes of the Knights of St. Patrick.
the army's own flag of St. Patrick's blue trimmed with gold ... The same colours were worn by the little guard of horsemen who rode in advance.
a troop of Free State cavalry clad in the attractive St. Patrick's blue and gold uniforms which were introduced for the Eucharistic Congress last June
(Grant Type: Registration; Register volume: G.O. MS 111G; Folio number: 20; Date: 9 November 1945)
Horses the property of the Irish National Stud Co. Ltd. may be raced under these Rules in the name of the President of Ireland, who shall be deemed to be the lessee of such horses.
In addition the Irish National Stud owned Suailce. Racing in the colours of H E the President and trained by our director Dermot Weld, she was a high class winner here at home.