It´s currently election time on Lanzarote. Which means visitors will see the blue, white and yellow tricolour of the Canary Islands flying across the island. But what are the origins of the islands current day emblem?
Despite its apparent simplicity, the existing flag of the Canary Islands took many years to evolve. Thanks to the Canaries complex political relationship with mainland Spain. And for many centuries the archipelago lacked a flag to represent the islands as whole.
Indeed, it was only in 1982 that the Canaries were first recognised as a fully autonomous community and it was at this time that today’s flag was consolidated into its current form of white, blue and yellow bands.
However, this colour combination enjoyed its first airing as far back as 1561. When – according to Jose Manuel Erbez, author of the authoritative website simbolosdecanarias – an emissary of the Spanish monarch of the time, Prince Philip II, presented a blue, yellow and white royal ensign to the Governor of Tenerife.
But at this point in time this symbol had little resonance or relevance – as the Canary Islands were yet to evolve a truly cohesive identity or unity.
The real roots of today’s flag lie in a marriage of the two maritime standards which became obligatory in the 1840’s at the major ports of Tenerife and Gran Canaria.
Tenerife’s flag was a dark blue background with the diagonal cross of St. Andrew imposed over the top. An exact replica of the flag of Scotland.
Whilst that in use in Gran Canaria was of an ensign divided diagonally into an upper triangle of yellow and a lower one of blue.
These two ensigns were to provide the basis for today’s tricolour. However the evolution of a coherent Canarian national identity – and widely used and recognised flag – only occurred in the 20th century. As a number of political movements lobbied for the independence of the islands.
Amongst these were a group headed by Canarian Antonio Cubillo, based in Algiers – called the Movement for the Self-determination and Independence of the archipelago. Their design for a Canarian flag was strikingly similar to that now in use, except that within the blue section of the flag there was a circle of green stars, which were to represent the seven islands of the archipelago.
This seven star motif first appeared on a proposed flag for the Canaries created by the Ateneo of La Laguna, an organisation based in Tenerife in the early 1900’s. Their original design was of a blue background with seven white stars distributed across the flag to represent the geographical placing of the islands in relation to each other. Although not widely employed, this flag of the Ateneo was later adopted by the Canarian Nationalist Party.
Yet another flag was proposed by a group of emigrants to Venezuela in the 1950’s, which consisted of the two maritime standards previously used for Tenerife and Gran Canaria combined. So, a diagonal cross of St Andrew on a background of horizontal bands of blue and yellow. This flag became the emblem for this non-resident group who had also formed to fight for the Independence of the Canary Islands.
The real originators of the actual were the Canarias Libre (Free Canaries) movement, led by Jesus Cantero Sarmiento. This group formed in 1961 and consisted of some influential young figures, including lawyers and other professionals. Who adopted the white, blue and yellow tricolour symbol as their official flag.
It has been suggested that the white and blue were placed on the western side of the flag to represent the province of Tenerife and the blue and yellow on the eastern side for Gran Canaria.
This symbol was finally enshrined in law on the 16th August 1982. As part of the Statute of Autonomy of the Canarian Autonomous Community, which declared: ‘The flag of the Canary Islands will be made up of three equal stripes in vertical position, whose colours are, from the hoist, white, blue and yellow’.
