Flag of Estonia
Estonia’s flag is three equal horizontal stripes of blue, black and white, blue at the top. No law gives the colours a meaning; the Government Office says nothing definitive was written about them, and that blue is generally read as the sky, black as the soil and white as the snow.
Easily confused with
How to read it
Article 7 of the constitution says the national colours of Estonia are blue, black and white, and leaves the design of the flag to law. The flag is 7 high by 11 long, and since 2005 the national flag and the state flag have been one and the same, the Government Office says. The colours began as those of the Estonian Students’ Society, chosen in Tartu on 29 September 1881, and the society’s first blue, black and white flag was consecrated at Otepää on 4 June 1884, now Estonian Flag Day. The Provisional Government approved it as the state flag on 21 November 1918, and the Riigikogu passed the State Flag Act on 27 June 1922.
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What the colours are said to mean
The students who chose the colours in 1881 wanted them to speak of Estonian nature, match the colours of folk costume and stand out from the six student corporations already at Tartu. The Government Office gives the general reading: blue for the sky, the future and truth; black for the soil, the past and love; white for the snow, spiritual light and hope. Store norske leksikon gives another: blue for loyalty and trust, black for the ancestors and a past of many centuries of “black thoughts”, and white for the snow and the future, with a third reading of blue for the sky, black for the earth and white for purity, work and duty.
Telling it from Botswana’s flag
No other national tricolour is blue, black and white, and the only other country whose state flag combines those colours is Botswana, the Government Office says. In Botswana’s flag the blue stands for the sky and water and the white-black-white for the racial harmony of its people, Botswana’s mission in Geneva says.
The flag that was hidden
The flag of 1884 went to the Estonian National Museum in 1934. After the Soviet occupation of 17 June 1940 national symbols were banned. In August 1940 Karl Aun, then chairman of the Students’ Society, swapped it for a duplicate made in 1934 and hid it on his father’s farm; it was taken out of hiding on 26 December 1991. It is on show at the Estonian National Museum in Tartu, and the Government Office calls it the oldest preserved original state flag in the world. The blue, black and white went back up on the Tall Hermann tower in Tallinn on 24 February 1989, Store norske leksikon says.
Read next
- Next in European flagsFlag of FinlandFinland’s flag is white with a blue cross, its upright set towards the pole. The flag law gives the colours no meaning; the design follows a proposal by Zacharias Topelius, in which the white stands for winter and the blue cross for the thousand lakes, Store norske leksikon says.
- The same shape in African flagsFlag of AngolaAngola’s flag is red over black with a yellow emblem in the centre: part of a cogwheel, a machete and a five-pointed star. Its constitution says the red is the blood shed by Angolans under colonial oppression, in the liberation struggle and in defence of the country, and the black is the African continent; the cogwheel stands for workers and industry, the machete for peasants, farming and the armed struggle, the star for international solidarity and progress, and their yellow for the country’s wealth.
More european flags
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols drawn with lines or squares and rectangles.
Sources
- Estonia 1992 (rev. 2015) Constitution, Constitution of the Republic of Estonia (1992, rev. 2015), Article 7 (English translation), Constitute Project, Article 7
- Estonian Flag Day – 4 June (Government Office of Estonia), Government Office of Estonia (Riigikantselei), “Estonian Flag Day – 4 June”, updated 5 June 2024, Riigikantselei (Government Office of Estonia), Story of our Flag; 12 facts about the Estonian flag
- Estlands flagg og våpen (Store norske leksikon), Lars Roede, “Estlands flagg og våpen”, Store norske leksikon, Store norske leksikon, Flagget
- National symbols (Permanent Mission of Botswana, Geneva), Permanent Mission of the Republic of Botswana to the United Nations Office at Geneva, “National symbols”, Permanent Mission of the Republic of Botswana, Geneva, National Flag
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 13, 2026. How we research
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