Triband (flag)

A tricolour (BE) or tricolor (AE) is a type of triband design which originated in the 16th century as a symbol of republicanism, liberty, or revolution.

[2][3] The flags of France, Italy, Romania, Mexico, Ireland and Paraguay[4] were all adopted with the formation of an independent republic in the period of the French Revolution to the Revolutions of 1848, with the exception of the Irish tricolour, which dates from 1848 but was not popularised until the Easter Rising in 1916 and adopted in 1919.

Based on a 1789 design of the Cockade of France, it was easy to construct and also stood in a visual opposition to complicated royal banners of the Ancien Regime.

The green-white-red tricolour remained a symbol of republicanism throughout the 19th century and was adopted as national flag by a number of states following the Revolutions of 1848.

The flag of Germany (black-red-gold) originates from the uniform colours of the Lützow Free Corps during the Napoleonic Wars, which contained volunteers from many German states and became famous through propaganda.

The political ideology of the unification of an ethnic nation state associated with tricolour flags since the 19th century has resulted in the design of new "tricolours" expressing specific nationalisms in the 20th century, the Pan-African colours adopted in the 1920s for Pan-Africanism, chosen in numerous African flags during decolonisation (green-yellow-red, taken from the triband design used by the Solomonic dynasty for the Ethiopian Empire since 1897).

The design symbolises liberty, and also the terraforming of Mars by humanity from a red planet to a green one, and eventually an Earth-like blue one.