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![[Varazdin County]](../images/h/hr-vzzup.gif)
by Zeljko Heimer, 14 October 2000
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Municipalities:
The flag of Vaarazdin county is the same as the flag of the
city of Varazdin, with addition of the county coat of arms.
Zeljko Heimer, 12 August 1996
The County of Varazdin is situated north of Zagreb, around the
city of Varazdin, former capital of Croatia (until XVIII c.). The
flag of the County is the same as the flag of the City, with
County's arms added on it. The escutcheon is the arms of Erd?dy
family that gave, among others, several Croatian bans - on
a mount vert a wheel proper, issuant therefrom a deer proper.
Zeljko Heimer
I have bought a book: Csa'ki, Imre: A magyar
kira'lysa'g va'rmegyéinek ci'merei a XVIII-XIX. sza'zadban,
Corvina, Budapest, 1995 , in which are shown (one big coat of
arms in each page!) all the coats of arms of the counties of the
Hungarian part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the XVIII. and
XIX. centuries.
For Varazdin, the coat of arms of the Hungarian "Varasd
va'rmegye" was: a circular shield with embellishments,
quartered: 1- gules a crowned eagle tongued gules; 2- and 3-
azure two six-pointed stars or between two wavy fesses argent; 4-
gules a city wall with a tower argent, the door closed, stones
apparent. On the whole an inescutcheon or a little mount vert
from which is issuing a wheel and an upright deer natural. The
shield is surmounted by a royal crown or. The coat of arms was
adopted in 1763.
Pascal Vagnat, 28 June 1998
The county in central northern Croatia. The establishment of
the county is lost into IX or X century, and was certainly in
existance when Hungaian dinasty took over the Croatian crown. It
was one of the few regions of Croatia that remained under
jurisdiction of the Parliament in Zagreb when everithing else was
lost to Turks. When in 1593 there was a great battle fought
against Turks by the city of Sisak, the victorious Croatian army
was lead by the _ban_, count Toma Erdo:dy. For this victory he
was given in 1607 the inheritable title of the _z<upan_ of the
County of Varazdin. The Erdo:dy family held the hereditary title
(and administration) until 1845, and even latter there were
several _z<upan_ from that noble family. Therefore it is of
little wander that in 1763 empress and queen Maria Teresia
confirmed the coat of arms of the County, which is essentially
equal to the family coat of arms of the counts Erdo:dy. This was:
quartered, 1. Guels, a crowned spread eagle Or: 2. and 3. Azure,
two wavy bars Argent, between them two sixpointed mullets Or; 4.
Gules, a massonry wall with tower Argent, gated and windowed
Maroon. Inescutcheon Or, on a triplle-mount Vert rising half
wheen Maroon from which rises a deer proper. The shield was oval
in 1763, with baroque ornamented goled border, and crowned.
This remained the coat of arms of the County until 1922, with one
notable exception in 1848, which I shall describe latter on.
There exists a preserved flag of the County from some time in
XIX. century, which is of five stripes red-white-red-white-red,
with a rectangular patch with blue background and painted in
black and white the county coat of arms.
During the events of 1848, there was a new coat of arms proposed,
and used for short time, as well as a flag to accompany it. The
coat of arms was Azure, on three mounts Vert three figures of men
shaking hands, accompanied with a crescent and star Argent. The
three men were said to be C<eh, Leh and Meh, three borthers of
Slavene mitology. There is a story connecting the brothers with
the city of Krapina, then within the Varazdin County, and star
and crescent are taken up from the "Old Croatian" coat
of arms (compare with the first coa in the "crown" of
the modern Croatian coa). The flag made according to this idea
seems to be yellow with rectangual patch bearing the image of
that coat of arms, but I have not found a good picture of it to
try to reconstruct it.
When the County of Varazdin was reestablished in 1993, the
question on the coat of arms was rised. Some of the members of
County Assembly objected to the old coat of arms for several
reasons - that the family arms is not appropriate of the County
(being "personal" coat of arms), that the family is in
origin Hungarian and therefore not appropriate - to name a few.
However, consluting heraldrists and historical archives in
Zagreb, it was concluded that the coat of arms as it is was
already adopted and used as the County coat of arms for more then
200 years, and that therefore it can not be considered a family
coat of arms any more. The guidelines that the Ministry of
Administration (MA) gave only supported that idea, giving right
to counties to use their historical coat of arms, and requiering
the flags to be of two colours pattern with coat of arms in them.
Therefore, the modernized (simplified shield-only) version of the
historical coat of arms was adopted on the County Assembly
session on 21-JUN-1995 (decision signed on 26-JUN), and the flag
to go with it is of five stripes red and white, with the coat of
arms to the hoist. This was approved by the MA on 18-JUL-1995.
The modern coat of arms is on a semi-cicrular shield, retaining
all the elements of the historical coat of arms, only modernizing
a bit the artistical redention. The coat of arms is offset to
hoist, so that the vertical axis is from hoist 6/10 of flag
height. The size of the coat of arms in flag is rather waguely
established in the decision, prescribing that it should
"cover the upper red stripe only with its insignificant
part, and the lower red a little bit more" (sic!). Accoring
to my calculations, that makes its' height be just
about 2/3 of the flag height.
Finally, to mention that in sveral my previous reports, I was
wrong regarding the position of the coat of arms in the flag,
reporting it to be not only offset towards the hoist, but also
towards the top. This was either simply my error (most probably),
of what I saw hoisted in the Assembly was errorneous, maybe some
earlyier proposal
for the flag (which I rather doubt, but do not what to exclude
entirely)
Sources:
1. Csaky, Imre: A magyar kiralysag varmegyeinek cimerei. A
XVIII-XIX. Szazadban, Corvina, Budapest, 1995. ISBN 963-13-4234-4
2. "Zupanija Varazdinska", Garestin, Varazdin 1995.
3. Atlagic, Mr. M.: grbovi plemastva u Slavoniji 1700-1918,
Zrinski, Cakovec, 1998.
4. Odluka o opisu i uporabi grba i zastave Zupanije Varazdinske,
Varazdin, 26. lipnja 1995. (Decision on description and use of
the coat of arms and the flag of the County of varazdin,
26-JUN-1995).
5. Rjesenje Ministarstva uprave, Kl. UP/I-017-02/95-01/03 Ur. br.
515-04-03/1-95-2, zagreb 18. srpnja 1995. (Approval of the
Minsitry of administration, 18-JUL-1995)
Zeljko Heimer, 29 July 1999
vz.gif)
by Zeljko Heimer, 14 October 2000
The deign of the CoA and the flag was aquired though a
concourse held in 1995. The jurry gave two prises - one for the
proposal for the flag (won by Tomislav & Edita Goluban from
Zagreb, who kindly provided the information), and the other for
the proposal for the CoA (won by Ivica Kruhoberec).
Among several designs that I was provided with by Golubans, I
chose to show two:
the winning flag proposal, blue with two wavy stripes and three 9-pointed stars in between:
by Zeljko Heimer, 14 October 2000
a proposal for a flag including the winning CoA proposal by Kruhoberec, red flag with two white strips (1:1:2:1:1), CoA quartered: 1 & 4, Gules two barrulets Argent, 2 & 3, Azure two Mullets between two barrulets wavy-counterwavy Or, in escutcheon Or issuant from triple Mount Vert a Wheel proper from which is isuing a Semi-Deer rampant proper:
by Zeljko Heimer, 14 October 2000
The jurry called upon the artist to work together for the
common design of the CoA and the flag based on their winning
designs and (apparently) in regard with guidelines from the
Ministry of Adminstration ending with the historical Erdody CoA
(i.e. the historical CoA of Varazdin County) modernized in shield
shape only, and with the flag being the same as the flag of
Varazdin City defaced with the CoA.
Zeljko Heimer, 14 October 2000