FRANCE ANCIENT

FRANCE ANCIENT

MILITARY & NAVAL FLAGS

Eighteenth Century

ARMY FLAGS & COLORS

Infantry & Artillery

French infantry and artillery regiments of the Royal Army carried two flags: a Colonel's Color and a drapeau d'ordonnance (flag of regulation). The former, for most regiments, was a simple white flag with a white cross sewn onto it, white being the heraldic color of the House of Bourbon. The latter was usually quartered by a white cross, with different combinations and arrangements of colors in the quarters for each regiment. Regiments with royal or princely titles often had gold fleurs-de-lis—the "lilies of France"—on the arms of the cross; usually these appeared on both the Colonel's Color and the drapeau d'ordonnance. Royal crowns, coats of arms and various other heraldic devices also appeared on some colors. The artillery was organized as a "single-branch" regiment and had infantry-pattern colors.

The Royal Army also included a large number of foreign regiments, and their colors were often quite different from the standard "French" pattern described above. Particularly striking were the drapeaux d'ordonnance of the Swiss regiments, which had multicolored "flames" in the quarters.

French infantry and artillery colors were made of silk and measured about 1.8 meters square. One Colonel's Color and, at various times, between two and fourteen drapeaux d'ordonnance were authorized for each regiment.

Some regiments, particularly the most ancient, bore the same name and drapeaux throughout their existence. Others went through a series of name changes, or were disbanded and later reformed, often with new drapeaux. This was particularly true of the foreign (mainly Swiss, German, Irish) regiments, which took the name of their colonel and often incorporated his livery colors or heraldic insignia into the design of their drapeaux. Where known, these changes are noted on the pages in this section.

Cavalry

Cavalry squadrons and regiments carried guidons (dragoons and hussars) or standards (line and household cavalry). For full details, see the relevant Archive Pages below.

Credits: The drawings the army pages are based on illustrations and descriptions from a wide range of sources. See in particular the Warflag wargaming site. Many members of the FOTW Mailing List also provided invaluable information, in particular Luc Baronian, Norm Martin, T.F. Mills, and Ian Sumner.

NAVAL ENSIGNS & FLAGS

Prior to the eighteenth century, the French King's ships flew a wide variety of flags, including the Banner of France (blue with three gold fleurs-de-lis) and flags with blue, red and white fields strewn with gold fleurs-de-lis. By 1700, however, a plain white flag was specified as the basic ensign of the Royal French Navy. Up to 1748, the galley fleet in the Mediterranean was separate from the sailing navy, and its ensigns were predominantly red.

The royal flag, white, strewn with gold fleurs-de-lis and displaying the full royal arms, was usually flown at sea only when the King or a member of his family was present on board ship, though individual ships and officers may also have been permitted to wear it as a special mark of royal favor. The plain white ensign also served as the admirals' rank flag. Full admirals displayed it at the mainmast, vice-admirals at the foremast and rear-admirals at the mizzenmast. There was also a white broad pennant for commodores. For large fleets divided into squadrons, the admirals of the van displayed a flag horizontally divided, white over blue, admirals of the center squadron displayed the white flag, and admirals of the rear squadron had plain blue flags.

In 1790, a canton of the colors of the Revolution was added to the white ensign and broad pennant. This canton, with equal horizontal stripes of red, white and blue, and a blue-red border, was the first version of the famous French Tricolor. A jack of the same design as this canton was also adopted. Though the monarchy was abolished in 1792, this ensign, jack and pennant remained in use until 1794, when the definitive blue-white-red Tricolor was made the national flag, ensign and jack of the French Republic.

The Bourbon Restoration of 1814-15 led to the abolition of the Tricolor and the reintroduction of white flags. The naval ensign was the white flag strewn with gold fleurs-de-lis, and the royal flag was also used at sea when the King or a member of his family was present. White flags were again abolished in favor of the Tricolor after the Revolution of 1830.