Last modified: 2002-12-20 by antonio martins
Keywords: respublika | oblast | kray | okrug | rayon | avtonomniy okrug | avtonomniy oblast |
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[Information in these lists and in the presentation of each division was compiled from various posts, contributed especially by William Crampton, Michael Simakov, Pascal Vagnat, Jorge Candeias Pascal Gross, Stuart Notholt, António Martins, Viktor Lomancov, Mark Sensen and Jos Poels, some of them dating from as early as 1995. — ed.]
This site was designed by Yu. Rocich. He wanted to make a big site on
flags and arms. Many people helped to Yuri (and me too). But now Yuri is
very busy, and the work on site is stopped until unknown date. The
information of this site is not complete, of course.
Victor Lomantsov, 09 Dec 2001
Most images were indeed taken from FOTW, and displayed (granted that
in a reduced format) without any acknowledgment, becoming obsolete as
FOTW-ws evolves
António Martins, 02 Feb 2002
I think they took their images from FOTW or other famous flag-sites.
Some are now outdated.
Victor Lomantsov, 18 Apr 2001
That is Ilya Morozov’s site. It shows a peculiar selection of flags.
Most of them (98 out of 100) come either from Pascal’s
site or from FOTW — some were taken from our site, some directly from
our mailing list. Most of the older images were meanwhile replaced on
FOTW-ws with better ones. (I’d also call your attention to the strange
translation options: oblasth being not translated and krai~
being anglicized as "region" — usually it is "territory", while "region" is
prefered for oblasth.)
António Martins, 29 Nov 2002
Shows images taken from Ilya Morozov's website...
Pascal Gross, 28 Jan 2002
All Russian Federation subdivisions are entitled to have flags,
but subjects other than republics were allowed to adopt flags only
shortly before (or in early) 1994.
António Martins, 20 Dec 1999 and 11 Mar 2000
Left without flag now are only the following 1st order subdivisions [flags meanwhile adopted overstriken and new info added — ed.]
Russian subdivisions flag laws are quite similar and actually they follow
each other almost word by word and in turn were based on the current russian
constitution (article about the flag, coat-of-arms, anthem and capital) and
flag laws — which in turn was taken with minor differences from the soviet
constitution of 1980, or possibly earlier.
António Martins, 20 Jan 2000
Unstrict enforcement of flag laws (regarding design) is not uncommon —
Adygeia flies a medium green flag and it’s
law says dark aquamarine, Yakutia flys a medium
blue flag and it’s laws says light blue, Chuvashia
flies a medium red flag and it's law says dark red, and probably more.
António Martins, 19 Apr 2000
In some russian regions (V. Novgorod,
f.i.) we have detected a pattern that the regional coat of arms
is the same as the capital city coat of arms (which in turn is
identical to the pre-1917 coat of arms), but with the traditional
achievements (imperial crown and oak wreath with band), while
the current city coat of arms shows only a civic crown.
António Martins, 04 Jan 2000
In russian heraldry (rules of 1857):
All major cities were granted arms during the tzarist era — these exist
today at least as traditional, unofficial coat of arms. In many cities,
these have been officially (re)approved as official. And note that some even
have had different coats of arms thrughout time, incl. in the soviet era,
(e.g., Osmk).
António Martins, 02 Jul 2001
We have seen that in most cases the adopted arms are identical to
the pre-1917 version, if not in detail, at least blazoned in the same
way. This is true for most division capital cities, for many non-capital
cities and even for the regions and territorries themselves (though
excluding most republics and a few of the other divisions).
António Martins, 08 Apr 2000
Construction of civic arms divided per fess (with arms of provincial centre
in upper part) is used in Russia since 1780ths. But in fact shields without
provincial arms in upper part are used (since 1850ths) very often. The shield
with prov arms looks “old fashioned”.
Victor Lomantsov, 30 Mar 2000
Russia is divided in 89 entities, called collectively subjects of the federation (ñóáúåêòû ôåäåðàöèè | subwekty federacii, sing. ñóáúåêò ôåäåðàöèè | subwekt federacii). As an heritage from the soviet era, each of these fall into one of the following cathegories (followed by the number of units for each):
Although Russia is still a very centralized country, it is nominally a federation and these first order divisions have each a constitution and locally elected government and parlament — as they are also entitled to have each a flag, an anthem and a coat of arms.
Immediately after 1991, the republics inherited (or upgraded themselves to) the status soviet ASSRs enjoyed, nominally autonomous inside RSFSR — as opposed to the other divisions at the same level. In 1994, though, this state of affairs changed and the privilegies enjoyed by the republics were extended to all russian first order divisions.
There are still differences between republics and other first order divisions. For instance, while the first have a president (ïðåçèäåíò | prezident), the former have a governor (ãóáåðíàòîð | gubernator); while the first have a capital (ñòîëèöà | stolica), the later have a center (öåíòð | centr); the word "republic" is always capitalized, while the other names are always in lower case; etc. But these are skin deep differences and in practice the way each region deals with the central government has little or nothing to do with its cathegory (again, except autonomous districts though including Chukchia). And this, as said, includes flags.
Of course the motive for soviet differenciation of ASSRs was the fact that these are regions inhabited by ethnic non-russians — though a severe critique about fairness and accuracy in the implementation of this principle would fill a thick book (it did fill some, actually) The same rationale applied to the autonomous districts and autonomous regions.
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000
As for second order divisions (subdivisions of first order divisions) in Russia, they fall on either of these cathegories:
Federal cities, though, do not have second order divisions, rather (for their size) being subdivided in third order divisions, just like second order divisions themselves. These are also of several types:
Seats of Village Councils may be:
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000
In the portuguese newspaper Público of May 19 there’s a report on
a division of Russia in 7 large regions, each with an appointed representative
of the central power, designed to control the subjects of the federation.
[See list.] I suppose these regions have no
flags, at least yet. (So, I’d say that the the russian region of the Far East
is the largest flagless area on Earth.)
Jorge Candeias, 26 May 2000
At first glance, these seem to coincide with the economic regions, but there are a lot of differences:
There are also the economic regions (ýêîíîìè÷åñêèé ðàéîí |
e^konomic^eskii~ rai~on) [See list],
which are not administrative divisions
and do not have flags. There are 11 of them, and their borderlines follow
the limits of the first order divisions. These regions are almost identical
to those of the soviet era, the only differences
being the new Northern economic region (including Karelia,
Komia, Nenetsia,
Vologda Region, Arkhangelsk
Region and Murmansk Region) carved out from
the Northwestern economic region, and the joining to the Northwestern economic
region of Kaliningrad Region. I am not sure wheather
these regions will be superceded by the recently approved
federal districts.
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000 and 01 Jun 2001
I think they’re official, though issued exclusively as philatelic items,
thus quite seldom used to post letters and parcels. And if so they’re mint
in Moscow and are almost surely not avaliable on the locations they
supposedly refer to, like Australian Antartica stamps and so on.
António Martins, 07 Nov 2000
Some former autonomous units upgraded themselves to full “sovereignship” inside the Fussian Rederation since 1991:
This means that only Adygeya,
Altay Republic,
Karachay-Cherkessia,
Khakassia,
Jewish Autonomous Region and
Chukchia changed their dependent status (the two
latter not having changed their denominations, which is most confusing).
All other areas (Aghin Buriatia,
Evenkia,
Khantia-Mansia, Koryakia,
Nenetsia, Perm’s Komia,
Taymyria, Ust-Ord Buriatia
and Yamal Nenetsia) were and remain dependent from
another federation subject, though all 89 of them are considered to be
federation subjects of their own (which is also most confusing).
António Martins, 29 May 2000