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Uruguay

República Oriental del Uruguay; Oriental Republic of Uruguay

by Francisco Gregoric and Željko Heimer, 6 Jul 2004

Official name of the country
Description of the flag
National coat of arms
Current cerimonial usage of historical flags

See also:

Other sites:

Símbolos patrios (government page about the national symbols)
reported by Dov Gutterman, 24 Aug 1999

Official name of the country

Eastern Province (Provincia Oriental) was the name of Uruguay before independence and meant that our country was at the east of Buenos Aires Province. This "Eastern" adjective was kept when the Independence of our country was achieved in 1828, but with a different meaning. From then on it was known as the República Oriental del Uruguay, i.e. the republic east side or the Uruguay River. This is still today the official name of Uruguay.
Jorge Cajarville, 16 Jun 1999

The official name of this country since the second constitution of 1917 is "República Oriental del Uruguay" (in the first constitution of 1830 was "Estado Oriental del Uruguay").
Rodolfo Tizzi, 10 Jul 2002

Actually, it's "República Oriental del Uruguay" with the article "el" which contracts with the preposition "de". The reason is that the name comes from it being on the east bank of the Uruguay river. The literal English translation is really something pretty awkward like "The Republic of the East of Uruguay."
Michael Newman, 13 Jun 2004

Description of the flag

Ratio: 2:3

The constuction details make the 9 stripes of equal width and a square canton of 5 stripes in width.

The flag description that I used to have always: nine horizontal stripes of white and blue with white square canton covering five top stripes, including a yellow sun in splendor.
Željko Heimer, 20 Jul, 2003

The external diameter of the Uruguayan sun is 11/15 the side of the square canton of the flag.
Francisco Gregoric, 5 Jul, 2004

Design of the sun

by Francisco Gregoric, 5 Jul 2004

The sun has sixteen rays, straight and wavy alternating.
Dov Gutterman, 13 May 2000, quoting from http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/7187/proudnation.htm

Each wavy ray is "divided" by a center wavy line. (in the same way each straight ray is divided by a center straight line). There is a picture of the Capitán Miranda, the school ship of the Uruguayan Navy with a Uruguayan National Flag with the "divided" wavy rays of the sun.
Francisco Gregoric, 5 Jul, 2004

National coat of arms

The arms consist of a quartered oval with blue in the first and fourth quarters and white in the second and third. There are scales for justice. The horse and ox represent liberty and plenty. There is a representation of a city on a hill. That city is Montevideo, and it symbolizes strength. The sun is the "Sun of May" first used in Argentina and is derived from its historical ties with what was then the United Provinces of the River Plata. (Sources: [smi80], [tal82] and [cra90])
Calvin Paige Herring, 13 Jun 1998

My little flag book (French translation of [ing79]) refers to the suns as "Sun of May" for Argentina and "Star of May" for Uruguay. This obviously refers to the same astrological-legendary object, but is there such a difference in Spanish official descriptions?
Tham-Tâm Lę, 16 Dec 1998

The Coat of Arms appears in the Presidential naval rank ensign.
Francisco Gregoric, 7 Aug 2004

Current cerimonial usage of historical flags

These three flags are the official National Flags of Uruguay:

the National Flag,
the Artigas flag,
and the 33 Orientals flag,

which almost always are placed together at the official Uruguayan places.
Blas Delgado Ortiz, 13 Dec 2001

In a recent visit of the spanish Kings to Uruguay, the Artigas flag, the national flag and the 33 Orientales flag shown togheter (as usual) in official acts and military parades.
Jaume Ollé, 10 Jun 1998