Flag of Switzerland to the "Arma Christi" that were especially venerated in the three forest cantons, and which they were allegedly allowed to display on the formerly uniformly red battle flag from 1289 by king Rudolph I of Habsburg at the occasion of a campaign to Besançon. Use of a white cross as a mark of identification of the combined troops of the Old Swiss Confederacy is first attested in the Battle of Laupen (1339), where it was sewn on combatants' clothing as two stripes of textile, contrasting with the red St. George's cross of Habsburg Austria, and with the St. Andrew's cross
Flag of the Netherlands Flag of the Netherlands The flag of the Netherlands () is a horizontal tricolor of red, white, and blue. The tricolor flag is almost identical to that of Luxembourg, except that it is shorter and its red and blue stripes are a darker shade. It originates as a variant of the older orange-white-blue "Prinsenvlag" ("Prince's Flag"), introduced in the 17th century as the "Statenvlag" ("States Flag"), the naval flag of the States-General of the Dutch Republic. Its official status as the national flag of the Kingdom of the Netherlands was formalized in 1937. The national flag of the Netherlands is