Flag of Ossetia

Proportion	1:2
Adopted	1990 (South Ossetia), 1991 (North Ossetia)
Design	A tri-horizontal bar flag with the colors white, red, and yellow

The Flag of Ossetia is a tricolor flag, top to bottom white, red, and yellow, used by the Ossetian people in Ossetia, a region spanning both sides of the Caucasus Mountains.

The flag is used by three distinct political entities: The Republic of North Ossetia–Alania (a federal subject of Russia), the self-declared Republic of South Ossetia – the State of Alania, and the Georgia-established Administration of South Ossetia.

South Ossetia has been under the control of the Russian Federation since the 2008 Russo-Georgian war and is mostly unrecognized by the international community. Georgia considers the Provisional Administration of South Ossetia to be the legal government of South Ossetia.

History

North Ossetia

Under the Soviet Union, the North Ossetian ASSR changed flags several times. The present flag was adopted on 2 October 1991 shortly before the collapse of the Soviet Union, and then reinstated on 24 November 1994.^[1]

Flag	Date	Use	Details
	1917–1922	Flag of the Mountainous Republic of the Northern Caucasus
	3 July 1937–29 July 1938	Flag of the North Ossetian ASSR	Russian written in Cyrillic and Ossetian written in Latin
	18 June 1938–16 June 1954	Flag of the North Ossetian ASSR	Russian and Ossetian both written in Cyrillic
	16 June 1954–24 June 1981	Flag of the North Ossetian ASSR
	24 June 1981–2 October 1991	Flag of the North Ossetian ASSR
	2 October 1991–10 December 1991	Flag of the North Ossetian ASSR, and then of the North Ossetian SSR
	10 December 1991–24 November 1994	Flag of the North Ossetian SSR, and then of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania

South Ossetia

Between 1922 and 1990, South Ossetia was an autonomous oblast of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic known as the South Ossetian Autonomous Oblast. As an autonomous oblast, it did not have its own flag, instead the Flag of Georgian SSR was used for official purposes.

The flag of the Republic of South Ossetia – the State of Alania was prescribed by the South Ossetian Constitution of 26 November 1990 and confirmed by the Regulation on the National Flag of 30 March 1992.^[2] Unlike North Ossetia, South Ossetia did not use the variant with the violet stripe from 1991 to 1994, instead continuously using the variant with the red stripe.

The Administration of South Ossetia was established by the Government of Georgia in April 2007.^[3] It uses the Ossetian flag together with the flag of Georgia.^[4][5]

Design

Symbolism

The flag is said to represent the social structure of ancient Ossetian society, which was divided into three social groups forming an organic whole: the military aristocracy, the clergy, and ordinary people.^{[citation needed]} The colors symbolize moral purity (white), martial courage (red) and wealth and prosperity (yellow). In blazons, the flag is described as Per fess Argent and Or, a fess Gules. The proportions are 1:2.^[6][7]

Color scheme

Gallery

• 
  Presidential standard of the Republic of South Ossetia
• 
  Standard of the head of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania
• 
  Flag of Ossetia as a vertical banner
• 
  Military parade in South Ossetia: flags visible on licence plates and on bunting
• 
  Protestors with Ossetian flags in front of the seat of the International Court of Justice in The Hague