Last modified: 2006-07-15 by antonio martins
Keywords: karelo-finnish | finno-karelia | world war ii | proposal | fir | tree | hammer and sickle (yellow) | hammer and sickle: solid star | hammer and sickle: no star | k.-s.s.n.t. | k.-f.s.s.r. |
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The Baltic states of Estonia,
Lithuania and Latvia
were able only to offer token resistance to Soviet occupation in
1940, but the fourth Baltic state, Finland,
fought back desperately and, although lost 10% of its territory,
survived as an independent state. When the Soviets invaded Finland
in 1940, a Provisional Finnish People’s Government was created
in Karelia as a precursor to Soviet rule being established in
Finland and the establishment of a Finnish SSR of which Karelia
would be part. A Finn-Karelian SSR was in fact proclaimed, in March
1940. However, when it became apparent that the Soviets had failed
in their aim of occupying Finland, this was downgraded to an
Autonomous Republic.
Stuart Notholt, 17 Sep 1995
In march 1940 the Karelian ASSR was promoted to the Karelo-Finnish
SSR (intended as a predecessor of a Finnish SSR, wich never was
established because Finaland couldn’t be conquered). A flag was
introduced according the Soviet-model: red with a yellow hammer and
sickle (but without a star) and the name in both Finnish (Karelian?)
and Russian.
Mark Sensen, 18 Mar 1996
The Karelian-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic (Karjalais-Suomalainen
Sosialistinen NeuvostoTasavalta) was established 31 March 1940 and
combined the territory of the former Karelian ASSR
with areas taken from Finland in the Winter War (the Karelian Isthmus, however,
was joined to the Leningrad Oblast).
Jan Oskar Engene, 29 May 1997
Finnish and Russian:
The flag is again red, with a hammer and sickle and under this the name
of the SSR written in Karelian/Finnish
and Russian all in yellow. The illustration in Paskov
[pas94] has a red star outlined in gold above
the script and hammer and sickle. According to Paskov, this was the 1940 flag
of the KFSSR.
Jan Oskar Engene, 29 May 1997
Red with in the upper hoist yellow name in sanserif in both Latin
(Karjalais-Suomalainen SNT) and cyrillic
(Карело-Финскайа
ССР). Little yellow hammer and sickle above.
Mark Sensen, 01 Jun 1996
As adopted by the Supreme Soviet of the Karelo-Finnish SSR on 9 June 1940, Article 118 of the K-FSSR Constitution read:
The State Flag of the Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic shall consist of a red cloth in whose left corner near the staff at the top, shall be placed a gold sickle and hammer and the inscription «Karelo-Finskaia SSR» in the Finnish and Russian languages. The proportion of width to length shall be 1:2.Dave Martucci, 06 Sep 1996
An interesting proposal, dated 1947, for a KFSSR is also shown in
Paskov [pas94].
While the flag is still based on the Soviet red flag model, the proposal
added a line of black stylized trees on blue that would have made it stand
out among SSR flags.
Jan Oskar Engene, 29 May 1997
The artwork in [pas94] shows a solid gold
star in both proposals. But checking
Laurla’s own Itä-Karjalan
tunnuksia [lau97], I found images with
red stars fimbriated in gold — as the author of this book was the one who
submitted the 1976 proposal, I rather trust this
source!
Jan Oskar Engene, 26 Jun 2001
The Latin (Finnish) inscription on the flag should read "K.-S.S.N.T."
(for Karjalais-Suomalainen Sosialistinen NeuvostoTasavalta) instead
of "K.-S.N.N.T.", as given by some sources.
Marco Pribilla, 07 Dec 2002
Could this 1947 proposal have been (one of) the inspiration(s) leading
to the more imaginative and distinct SSR flag designs adopted in
1949-1954? If it weren’t for the inscription
(omnipresent in contemporary soviet subnational flags), it could have been
one of the new lot.
António Martins, 20 Jun 2001
Instead [of the refered proposal,] a more conventional
flag was adopted for the KFSSR in 1953. This was red, with two narrow stripes
of blue over green along the bottom. A red star outlined in gold star, along
with gold hammer and sickle was set in the canton. No lettering appeared on
the flag.
Jan Oskar Engene, 29 May 1997
This flag was the only one, among the 16 soviet
SSR flags, to have a third non-white color, adding to the scarlet
background the unique combination of light blue
and green. It may have been influenced by the 1947 proposal,
and certainly influenced the current Karelian
flag.
António Martins, 29 May 2001
In the early 1950s like the other SSRs a flag was adopted
horizontal red-blue-green (19:5:6) with yellow hammer, sickle and yellow
outlined star.
Mark Sensen, 18 Mar 1996
Regarding the Karelo-Finnish SSR, in the K-FSSR Constitution of 1953 (strangely, no exact date is given in [tfb]), Article 118 was changed to read:
The State Flag of the Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic shall be a cloth, consisting of three colored strips horizontally placed: The upper being red; the middle being light blue, comprising one-sixth the width of the flag, and the lower, green, comprising one-fifth the width of the flag. On the red strip, in the left upper corner near the staff, shall be placed a gold sickle and hammer and, above them, a red five-pointed star edged in gold. The proportion of the width of the flag to its length shall be 1:2.Dave Martucci, 06 Sep 1996
 image by Mark Sensen, 18 Mar 1996 | 
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No hammer, sickle and star on the
reverse side.
Mark Sensen, 25 May 1997
Inscriptions on the Coat-of-Arms of Soviet Karelia according to the constitution of Summer 1940 — in Finnish (proper) and Russian (Completely new emblem):
Anything below this line was not added by the editor of this page.