Flags of the Philippine Revolution

During the Philippine Revolution, various flags were used by the Katipunan secret society and its various factions, and later, after the Katipunan had been dissolved, the Philippine Army and its civil government.

Other flags were the personal battle standards of different military zone commanders operating around Manila.

A set of flags used by the Katipunan along with the Philippine national flag was flown at government institutions and building in occasion of the Philippine Centennial celebration in 1998. These set are often erroneously said to portray the "Evolution of the Philippine Flag". The Manila Historical Institute and the National Historical Institute has refuted the error saying that the flags excluding the current national flag are more rightfully referred as "Flags of the Revolution". While many of the depicted symbols and layouts on some of the flags have inspired the national flag, there is no direct relationship.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

–

10.

With the establishment of the Katipunan, Andrés Bonifacio requested his wife, Gregoria de Jesús, to create a flag for the society. De Jesús devised a simple red flag bearing the society's acronym, KKK, white and arranged horizontally at the center. This became the society's first flag. Bonifacio stated the "K" in the middle of the Sun stood for Kalayaan, Freedom.

Some Katipunan members used other variations. One variation has the three Ks arranged in the form of a triangle. Some others used a red flag with only one K.

When the revolution heated up, the Magdiwang faction of the Katipunan, which operated in Cavite under Mariano Álvarez, adopted a flag consisting of a red banner with a white sun with the baybayin (the ancient Tagalog script) letter ka (for K) at the center.

The Magdalo faction of the Katipunan, which also operated in Cavite under Emilio Aguinaldo, used a flag similar to the Magdiwang faction's, featuring a white sun with a baybayin letter ka. The sun initially had an indefinite number of rays and was later standardized to eight rays, to represent the eight provinces that Spanish colonial authorities placed under martial law (Manila, Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Bulacan, Pampanga, Bataan, and Nueva Ecija). An eight-rayed sun was later used in the national flag of the Philippines.

...
Wikipedia