Flag of Ethiopia

Ethiopia’s flag has three equal horizontal bands: green at the top, yellow in the middle, and red at the bottom. A blue disk at the center carries an interlaced yellow pentagram and five yellow rays. The ordinary national flag is twice as wide as it is high.

Read the horizontal bands from top to bottom as green, yellow, and red. Each band occupies one third of the flag’s height. The blue disk overlaps all three bands, while the star and rays are yellow. Reversing the outer bands or omitting the emblem changes the current national design.

The ordinary flag has a width-to-height ratio of 2:1, also written as 1:2 when height comes first. A 120-by-60-centimeter rectangle has this shape. The proclamation separately specifies a 40-by-30-centimeter flag for designated official vehicles, so the ordinary ratio should not be applied to that exception.

The supplied digital reference uses green #078930, yellow #FCDD09, red #DA121A, and blue #0F47AF. These are the actual SVG colors, not numerical codes enacted in the flag proclamation. The law names the colors without prescribing HEX, RGB, CMYK, or Pantone values; printed fabric therefore requires a separate color proof.

The 2009 proclamation associates green with labor, fertility, and development. This official explanation is more specific than simply calling green a landscape color. Other popular accounts may emphasize vegetation or hope, but those interpretations should be distinguished from the meanings expressly assigned by the current flag law.

The yellow band represents hope, justice, and equality under the 2009 proclamation. Yellow also appears in the central star and rays, where the emblem’s separate explanation applies. Sharing a color does not mean that the background band, star lines, and radiating strokes all have one identical legal meaning.

The proclamation connects red with sacrifice and heroism in the pursuit of freedom and equality. Descriptions referring to blood shed for Ethiopia summarize part of that association, but the law’s wording is broader. It places the color within the country’s collective struggle and the values represented by the flag.

The blue circular background of Ethiopia’s national emblem represents peace. It is centered on the flag and reaches halfway into the green and red bands. The circle is an integral part of the national design, rather than a decorative backdrop that can be removed while retaining the current official flag.

The star represents unity founded on the common will of Ethiopia’s peoples. Its straight, equal lines signify equality among Nations, Nationalities, Peoples, and religions. The proclamation does not assign each of the five points to a particular ethnic group, region, or religion, so such one-to-one mappings should not be invented.

The familiar national emblem has five yellow rays around its interlaced five-pointed star. The flag law associates the rays with a bright future for Ethiopia’s peoples. These strokes are separate from the pentagram’s lines; replacing the whole emblem with a solid yellow star loses both its construction and its meaning.

The disk’s diameter is two thirds of the flag’s height. This follows from the legal requirement that its outer edge reach the midpoint of both the green and red bands. On the supplied 1200-by-600 reference, the disk measures 400 pixels across and is centered at coordinates 600, 300.

The blue-disk federal emblem was established by Proclamation 16/1996, effective February 6, 1996. Its circle placement was amended on October 31 that year. The present flag proclamation took effect on August 28, 2009. These are distinct milestones, while the green-yellow-red tricolor tradition is considerably older than the federal emblem.

Proclamation 48/1996 amended the earlier law so that the blue emblem’s circumference reached the midpoint of the green and red bands. It also replaced the pictorial representation. The amendment took effect on October 31, 1996, establishing the placement rule later repeated in the replacement flag law of 2009.

Flag Proclamation 654/2009 sets out the design, official meanings, sizes, display procedures, mourning rules, and prohibited uses. Proclamation 863/2014 later amended Flag Day and mourning authority during parliamentary recess. The Ministry of Justice lists these laws as in force, while the two 1996 flag enactments were replaced.

Article 3 describes green, yellow, and red horizontal bands of equal size with a national emblem at the center. It connects the emblem with equality and unity among Ethiopia’s peoples and religious communities. It also permits member states of the federation to have flags and emblems determined by their legislatures.

The rectangular tricolor is associated with Menelik II and 1897, following earlier uses of the national colors. Its central devices changed through imperial, socialist, transitional, and federal periods. The age of the color tradition should therefore be distinguished from the adoption of the present blue disk and yellow star.

The crowned Lion of Judah belongs to Ethiopia’s imperial flag tradition. Historical state flags showed the lion carrying a cross-topped staff, although artwork varied. The current federal national flag uses a yellow pentagram on a blue disk instead. A lion-bearing historical reference is therefore not the present national design.

A plain green-yellow-red tricolor has historical and cultural significance, but the 2009 proclamation requires the national flag to include the emblem. It expressly prohibits using the national flag without it. Historical illustrations and accounts of earlier civil flags should not be presented as authorization for an emblem-free current national flag.

Reference catalogs credit Abebe Alambo with the federal emblem. The proclamations reviewed establish the design and its meaning but do not name an individual designer. That attribution should therefore be identified as a catalog credit, while modern vector illustrators should be credited separately for the particular artwork being reproduced.

Use a complete master with equal green, yellow, and red bands, a centered circular blue disk, and the full interlaced yellow star and rays. Preserve the appropriate proportions and prescribed size for the intended setting. Proof the actual fabric and inks rather than treating a monitor preview as manufacturing approval.

The proclamation lists six ordinary sizes. Expressed as width by height in centimeters, they are 420 by 210, 300 by 150, 270 by 135, 210 by 105, 180 by 90, and 42 by 21. Different sizes serve squares, buildings, ships, processions, street displays, and specified official desks.

Article 11 provides a special flag for designated official vehicles: 40 centimeters wide and 30 centimeters high. That is 4:3 in width-to-height terms, unlike the ordinary 2:1 flag. The exception concerns specified official use; it does not make every privately displayed car flag an authorized official vehicle flag.

Ethiopia’s Flag Day falls on the first Monday of Tikimt, an Ethiopian calendar month, under the 2014 amendment. It normally occurs in Gregorian October, but it is not defined as the first Monday of that Gregorian month. For example, the National Bank marked the 2025 observance on October 13.

Yes. The original 2009 proclamation specified the second Monday of Meskerem. The 2014 amendment replaced that provision with the first Monday of Tikimt. Both are Ethiopian calendar months. An account using the older Meskerem rule without identifying it as superseded gives the wrong current statutory basis for the observance.

Ethiopia’s national history does not fit a simple colonial-independence anniversary. Adwa Victory Day, observed on March 2, recalls the 1896 victory over an invading Italian army. Patriots’ Victory Day on May 5 recalls liberation from the later Italian occupation. These historical commemorations are separate from the annual Flag Day.

The proclamation identifies daily display at specified public institutions, schools, military and police establishments, border facilities, diplomatic premises, and Ethiopian merchant ships and boats, subject to its exceptions. It also addresses other government offices on public holidays and election locations. These provisions should not be rewritten as a universal daily household obligation.

For ordinary displays covered by Article 15, the stated hours are 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Schools raise the flag before classes and lower it at 6 p.m. Holiday display covers the eve, the holiday, and the following day within the daily hours; a military emergency-area exception also exists.

In a paired display, the proclamation places Ethiopia’s national flag on the right as understood from the flag party’s viewpoint, facing the observers. This is the viewer’s left. Multi-flag arrangements have additional rules, and the provisions for regional flags differ from those governing foreign flags and international organizations.

Article 20 places the flag five meters ahead of the first guard-of-honor row. It describes holding the lower staff with the right hand and the upper portion with the left, centered before the body, with accompaniment. This specific procession rule should not be treated as a universal spacing rule for every parade.

The national design is defined in its ordinary horizontal arrangement, with green above yellow above red and a centered emblem. The reviewed proclamation does not provide a separate universal vertical-display construction. Follow the responsible organizer’s applicable instructions, preserve the complete design, and avoid importing another country’s rotation rule without evidence.

Article 22 provides for half-masting during declared national mourning following the death of specified senior leaders, including former officeholders, and other persons designated by the House of Peoples’ Representatives. The 2014 amendment allows the Speaker to act during recess. The particular declaration determines the occasion; the article does not announce ongoing mourning.

The proclamation expressly states that the flag is not flown at half-mast when national mourning coincides with an official holiday. This is an Ethiopian statutory exception, not a general rule for every country. The relevant declaration and the amended numbering of Article 22 should be checked when applying the provision.

Article 22 directs that a flag covering a coffin be folded before the coffin is lowered into the grave, so that the flag does not touch the ground. This handling rule is separate from the declaration of national mourning. It does not establish one mandatory ceremonial fold pattern in the reviewed text.

Article 23 prohibits several uses, including omitting the emblem, defacing the flag, displaying a damaged or faded flag, incorrect design or timing, certain covering uses, commercial advertising, and failure to honor raising or lowering. Its categories are specific; they should be read alongside the law’s scope rather than reduced to one vague etiquette rule.

The 2009 proclamation expressly lists commercial advertising among prohibited flag uses. Public-domain status for a drawing does not remove that separate restriction on the national symbol. A downloadable image may be useful for education and identification, but its copyright status should not be mistaken for government approval of a commercial campaign.

Yes. Article 24 sets maximum fines and imprisonment terms for prohibited acts, with a higher maximum for using the flag without its emblem. It also provides a separate fine rule for legal persons. These are statutory provisions in the text reviewed, not predictions about how a particular case will be handled.

The proclamation prohibits displaying old, faded, or torn flags and directs respectful burning when a flag has become unusable. It separately calls for flags associated with historical events to be kept in museums. Routine care should follow the fabric maker’s instructions, while a potentially historic textile needs preservation assessment before disposal.

Ethiopia’s longstanding tricolor and its importance as a symbol of African sovereignty helped make green, yellow, and red influential Pan-African colors. Later national flags adopted related palettes in their own arrangements. That shared visual tradition does not mean their symbols, proportions, histories, or officially assigned color meanings are identical.

Ethiopia uses green, yellow, and red horizontal bands with a blue disk containing a yellow pentagram and rays. Ghana uses red, yellow, and green horizontal bands with a solid black star. The supplied Ethiopian reference is 2:1, while Ghana’s is 3:2, giving the rectangles visibly different shapes.

Mali arranges green, yellow, and red in three vertical bands, with green at the hoist and no central emblem. Ethiopia uses the same color sequence horizontally and adds its blue disk and yellow star. The supplied references also differ in proportions: Ethiopia is 2:1, while Mali is 3:2.

The photograph records a meeting between Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken in Washington, D.C., on December 13, 2022. Ethiopia’s flag appears in the diplomatic setting. The caption identifies historical roles and an event date; it does not describe today’s officeholders or a color-calibration reference.

Choose the complete national-flag SVG for a scalable illustration of the current design. The emblem close-up, construction sheets, historical references, comparisons, timeline, and display diagrams serve different educational purposes. Keep their labels and captions with them, and obtain the required production master before treating an explanatory picture as an official manufacturing specification.

Ethiopia’s flag emoji is 🇪🇹, formed from the regional-indicator letters ET. Platforms may show a small flag or display the letters instead. The tiny emblem can vary with the operating system and font, so an emoji should not replace a detailed flag drawing when accuracy of shape and color matters.