Flag of El Salvador

How to read it

The flag is defined by El Salvador’s Ley de Símbolos Patrios, Decree 115 of the Legislative Assembly, of 14 September 1972. Article 5 describes two horizontal blue stripes with a white stripe between them, all three of the same size. The law gives sizes rather than a ratio, for three official flags: the magna flag, 3.35 m long by 1.89 m high (11 ft by 6 ft 2 in), with the full coat of arms, for occasions when all three branches of government take part and for national holidays; the flag for public buildings and offices, 1 m by 60 cm (3 ft 3 in by 2 ft), with the motto DIOS UNION LIBERTAD (God, Union, Liberty) on the white stripe; and the parade flag, 1.45 m by 90 cm (4 ft 9 in by 2 ft 11 in). The present flag was adopted on 17 May 1912 on the initiative of President Manuel Enrique Araujo and first raised on 15 September 1912, El Diario de Hoy writes; the 1972 law repealed the 1912 decree.

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Why some flags have the arms and others the motto

El Diario de Hoy explains that the version with the coat of arms is used by government institutions, embassies, government delegations and the army, and the version with the motto in gold letters by individuals and non-government organisations, such as schools. In the law, the arms go on the magna flag and the motto on the flag for public buildings and offices.

The coat of arms piece by piece

Article 2 of the law describes an equilateral triangle with gold lines. At its base is a range of five green volcanoes, smaller from left to right, on land washed by two seas; above them a rainbow; under the rainbow the cap of liberty, a Phrygian cap on a gold staff, giving off light, with the date 15 DE SEPTIEMBRE DE 1821 in a half circle. Around the triangle, in gold, runs REPUBLICA DE EL SALVADOR EN LA AMERICA CENTRAL, and DIOS UNION LIBERTAD is written at its base. Five flags of El Salvador spread from the triangle, and two laurel branches tied with a blue and white ribbon have as many clusters of leaves as the country has departments: 14, El Diario de Hoy says. The arms were drawn by the calligrapher Rafael Barraza Rodríguez, who won a 1912 competition held by the Ministry of War and Navy. Writers and poets have read them in different ways, the newspaper notes: the triangle as liberty, equality and fraternity, the five volcanoes as the parts of the old Central American homeland, the Phrygian cap as freedom from foreign rule.

Telling it from Nicaragua’s and Honduras’s flags

Nicaragua’s flag is the closest look-alike: the same blue-white-blue horizontal stripes, and a coat of arms that is also an equilateral triangle with five volcanoes between two seas, a rainbow and a cap of liberty. The arms tell them apart. Nicaragua’s 1971 law describes its arms as two elements only, the triangle and a ring of gold lettering reading REPUBLICA DE NICARAGUA AMERICA CENTRAL, and its five volcanoes are of equal height; El Salvador’s triangle is framed by five flags and a laurel wreath, and its volcanoes get smaller from left to right. Nicaragua’s law also sets a ratio of 3 to 5 and calls its blue cobalt blue. Honduras’s flag has the same stripes with five blue stars in place of a coat of arms.

Where the blue and white came from

The colours are those of the Central American federation, decreed by its National Assembly on 21 August 1823. El Diario de Hoy recounts that Manuel José Arce chose them when he led the Salvadoran militias against the annexation to Mexico in 1822, inspired by the colours of the Argentine leaders San Martín and Belgrano; the flag of Argentina is also light blue and white.