The Republic of Estonia

The Flag of Estonia

Eesti lipp

The Estonian tricolour gained prominence in the 1880's when it was first used by the Estonian Students Society. The nationalist movement began to gain momentum in the 1890's in response to the Russian Empires programme of "Russification" in Estonia. The campaign began by wanting more autonomy, and the right to study their own history. The demands grew into full independence for Estonia from Russia.

With the collapse of the Russian Empire, Estonia was able to declare its independence, and the tricolour became the national flag of a free Estonia. Estonia managed to keep its independence after repulsing attacks from Soviet Russia, and the German Freikorps. Estonia kept its independence until the Soviet Union marched in at the beginning of the Second World War. Estonia's casualties have been rated at 25% of the population. 

The Soviet Union proceeded to rig the vote for Estonia to join the Soviet Union, by hand-picking members of parliament, and getting them voted in. If they did not vote the way their new Soviet masters wanted, they where "disappeared."

Due to the illegal nature of the Soviet Union's actions, Estonia managed to maintain an independent diplomatic service for all the while Estonia was part of the USSR!

During its time under the Soviet Unions control, Estonia was given a new flag. It was in line with the flags of the other USSR republics, a red banner with the golden hammer and sickle, and some kind of device to differentiate them. Estonia's flag had a series of blue and white waves running along the bottom of the flag.

In the 1980's, the movement for Estonia began to move back into motion once more. This time, pushing for economic autonomy from the Soviet Union, but as the Soviet Union weakened, the push grew stronger and stronger, moving from claims for autonomy to full independence.

In 1989, during the Singing Revolution, The Baltic Way organised a huge demonstration of 2 million people forming a human chain, stretching from Estonia, through Latvia, and into Lithuania.Estonia finally gained its independence in 1991, and the Estonian tricolour flew once more over the nation.

However, some in Estonia feel that the tricolour shows Estonia to be a post Soviet, Eastern European nation, when many in Estonia felt themselves to be more Nordic than Baltic. Indeed, there was a campaign to change the flag from the tricolour, to a nordic style cross.

Many nordic cross designs had been nominated back in 1919...

...but the movement never really gained traction, as the tricolour was seen as an important national symbol.

The flag itself is made up of 3 bars, blue, black, and white. The blue represents the sky over Estonia, the black represents the links the Estonian's have with their land, as well as the black nature of their history. The white represents hard work, purity, commitment, as well as possibly standing for the white sails of ships.