The Red Dragon
Written by lara
We can find meaning in everything in our world; numerology that are supposedly send to us by angels, our grieved ones that visits us in animal form, read our future in the marc of our coffee…Things that mean something else. We can choose or not to find meaning in the things around us, but what if, for this article at least, I tell you all about the signification of something centuries old?
Colours are one subjective thing if it ever existed one. We accord them different meaning depending on where we’re from. For example, in Western cultures black is a colour of mourning, but in China the colour of choice will be white, because it symbolizes purity and the cycle of life. If you go in South Africa, you’ll notice that they chose red as the mourning colour because it symbolises the blood of the deceased. Colours being so versatile and symbols of something else they naturally found their places on our flags.
Flags are the emblems of our lands, demonstrating colours of power and strength. Each of them meaning something else as we already established. In a land not so far away (or maybe really, really far away depending on where you’re currently reading this) there were dragons.
The Welsh flag is actually one of the oldest ones in the human history, even though it was technically made the official flag of Wales only in 1959. Green and white are associated with the Tudors, added to the national flag by the royal family itself around the 16th century. In other sources, white is representing peace and honesty whether green means joy. About the central piece, the unmissable red dragon, it’s a symbol of the bravery and valour of the Welsh people. The Red Dragon flag, otherwise called “y Draig Goch” in the national language According to the historians, at the time of the Roman’s occupation of Britain, the Red Dragon was the emblem of the Emperor Trajan. And after the troops left the Welsh just kept the symbol as their own.
Another theory, well more of a legend actually, comes from a passage in the myth of King Arthur. It is said that there were two dragons, that fought day after day, year after year, restlessly combating one another. In the end, the red dragon came out victorious, dominating his opponent, the white dragon. In this legend, the red dragon is obviously the Welsh successfully defeating the invading Anglo-Saxons, symbolised by the white dragon.
So there you go folks, a little in-depth description of what the glorious flag of Wales reprsents. It’s still amazing to me just how much us humans accord meanings and significations to things we hold dear at heart, how much we want to see signs everywhere, how every little or big thing holds a signification. On those wise words I’ll leave you to the rest of your day ! Till soon.
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