Flag of Iran

Flag origins

Iran’s flag has green-white-red horizontal bands and the red emblem of the Islamic Republic in the center. Article 18 of the Constitution specifies these colors, the special emblem and the motto Allāhu Akbar, God Is Great. The tulip-like emblem combines four crescent forms and a sword into a stylized Arabic Allah. Devised after the 1979 revolution, it replaced the Lion and Sun on the flag in 1980. Along the boundaries of white with green and red, Allāhu Akbar appears in Kufic-style lettering eleven times above and eleven below, twenty-two times in total.

Flag story

Twenty-two recalls 22 Bahman in the Iranian calendar, February 11, 1979, the date commemorating the monarchy’s fall in the revolution. The phrase is said to be repeated twenty-two times for that reason. Before the revolution, the same tricolour carried the Lion and Sun: a sword-bearing lion with a rising sun behind it. That centuries-old Iranian emblem was abolished after 1979 and replaced with the Islamic Republic’s emblem.

Editorial notes and references

Edited by ABELHA WORKS. The English text translates the administrator-edited Japanese description. Legends should be distinguished from documented history. General reference links do not substantiate every statement in the text.

• Iran — general information on Wikipedia
• Japan MOFA: countries and regions (Japanese)

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