Prince's Flag

The Prince's Flag (Dutch: Prinsenvlag, German: Prinzenflagge) is a Dutch historical flag, originally used by the Dutch Republic during the Eighty Years War, as observed during the first battle of Den Briel. The Prince's Flag is based on the Flag of Prince William of Orange-Nassau, hence the name. The colours are orange, white and blue, which is why the flag is often called oranje-blanje-bleu (or even: ranje-blanje-bleu) in Dutch, and orange-weiß-blau in German. The colour orange represents the Principality of Orange which Prince William inherited from René of Chalon, the white stripe represents the struggle for freedom and supremacy, and the blue colour is the signature colour of the former County of Nassau.

The Prince's Flag was first introduced by Sea Beggars in the Capture of Brielle in 1572. In 1587, the Admiralty of Zeeland ordered these flags to fly on their warships. It soon became a symbol of the Dutch Revolt and was adopted by the Dutch Republic. The orange in the flag gradually changed to red around 1650, becoming the flag of the Netherlands still in use today. The reason for this is unknown, although several theories exist. The orange-white-blue flag, however, continued to be flown as well and in later times formed the basis for the former South African flag. It is also the basis for the flags of New York City and Albany, New York. After the republican Patriots, aided by the French, seized control over the Netherlands in 1795, the Prince's Flag was forbidden and the red-white-blue flag became the only official flag, to the content of the French, analogous as they were to their own tricolour, chosen just a few months earlier. In the following period of the Kingdom of Holland, there was also no place for Orange and the Bonapartist King Louis I chose red.

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