Flag of Belgium Flag of Belgium The national flag of the kingdom of Belgium (, , ) is a tricolour of three bands of black, yellow, and red. The colours were taken from the coat of arms of the Duchy of Brabant, and the vertical design may be based on the flag of France. When flown, the black band is nearest the pole (at the hoist side). It has the unusual proportions of 13:15. After the death of Charlemagne, the present-day territory of Belgium (except the County of Flanders) became part of Lotharingia, which had a flag of two horizontal red stripes separated
Flag of Romania punished for having worn the tricolor. From 1859 until 1866, the United Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia had a red-yellow-blue Romanian tricolor, with horizontal stripes, as national flag. The flag was described properly in "Almanahul român din 1866": "a tricolor flag, divided in three stripes, red, yellow and blue and laid out horizontally: red above, blue below and yellow in the middle". Although the Ottoman Empire did not allow the United Principalities to have their own symbols, the new flag gained a degree of international recognition. Relating prince Cuza's May–June 1864 journey to Constantinople, doctor Carol Davila observed: "The Romanian