File talk:Flag of Eswatini.svg

swaziland has been a country for 15 years!!!! --65.121.169.154

Closer to 38, I think. ¦ Reisio 04:49, 27 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

ugh.....[edit]

eswatini has GREY tassels??????????? nope!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ITS BLUE — Preceding unsigned comment was added by 190.192.243.51 (talk) 02:26, 9 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Current flag of Eswatini[edit]

The sources given by User:BlinxTheKitty https://www.fotw.info/flags/sz.html and http://www.vexilla-mundi.com/ do not meet in any way the requirements for evidence for claims in all wiki projects. Flags of the world (FOTW) is itself a kind of wiki and partly also something like a forum, where volunteer users can post flags they have painted themselves according to their hobby and taste, often also pure fantasy flags, and add text to them.
The text at FOTW: "The official government website shows that the eSwati flag changed in 2011..." is obviously Fake News. The link to the alleged official government website http://www.gov.za/images/stories/SWAZI%20FLAG.jpg leads to a 404 error message on a blank white page: "Not Found - The requested URL "/images/stories/SWAZI%20FLAG.jpg" was not found on this server."
It should also be noted that the URL of the link to the alleged official government website contains the top-level domain of South Africa "za". Should the link target have at some time actually shown a similar flag image, it was in any case not on the "official government website of Eswatini"
The fact that the pictures of the two sources http://www.vexilla-mundi.com/ given by you are similar is not surprising, since Vexilla Mundi itself admits to use the Flags of the world (FOTW) site among others for the contents of its own website. Vexilla Mundi is, by the way, a purely private hobby website of a single unknown person and is thus completely irrelevant as reputable evidence for a Wiki-relevant statement.
In any case, an official statement on a flag change can neither be found on the official government website or other authorities, nor in any media from Eswatini, such as Swaziland Times, Eswatini Observer, Independent News Eswatini etc.
Thus it is also not surprising that if one looks at current official web pages even after the alleged change 10 years ago, the flag still looks the same everywhere as it did everywhere looks like since 1968:
- Official homepage of the government of The Kingdom of Eswatini
- Embassy of The Kingdom of Eswatini to the Kingdom of Belgium and the European Communities
- Embassy / Permanent Mission of The Kingdom of Eswatini in Geneva - Switzerland
- Federal Foreign Office (Germany)
- Federal Department of Foreign Affairs FDFA (Switzerland)
- Eswatini on the official website of FIFA
- Eswatini > CIA World Factbook
- Eswatini > Brockhaus Encyclopedia
- and many more
So as long as there is no official announcement of the country of Eswatini or its government about a change of the flag, which can be verifiably read in a reputable source and/or as even more important and eye-catching indicator the flag on the official website of the government of Eswatini shows no change, we here at WikiMedia and Wikipedia do not engage in theorizing rather we show the current facts as they can be seen e.g. on the official website of the government of Eswatini.--Ciao • Bestoernesto • ✉ 04:53, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not keen on describing this apparent change in some of the minor specifications of the flag as a "change in 2011" without more detail on how the Swati government themselves see the new version. As you say, they are clearly happy to continue using the more familiar style in small illustrations on their websites. But let's not get distracted by the editor mistyping URL on the FOTW page - the correct address is http://www.gov.sz/images/stories/SWAZI%20FLAG.jpg, used on the page https://www.gov.sz/index.php/national-symbols. I'd say it's a good idea to pay as much attention to the illustration presented on the official webpage about the flag as to the small images used in the header of the official website.

You will note that the colour of the feathers is not the only difference in the two depictions - the shape of the shield, the feathers, and the colour of the stick/spears is also different. While the "official" illustration on the website includes photo-realistic shading that is impractical for most flags, we can see in numerous photos (example) online that at least some official use of the flag follows the basic pattern shown in that image.

(And yes, FOTW pages do have editors, it's not quite a wiki where any contribution appears. I'd say it's very rare for there to be "pure fantasy" flags contributed by users, but it is true that the general policy is to report on flags shown in other less reliable source, including some pure fantasies, and sometimes the editing makes this clearer than others...) JPD (talk) 02:07, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

December 2022[edit]

Why does people keep updating and updating for God's sake??? The current version uploaded on 3 December 2022 is weird. ColorfulSmoke (talk) 04:56, 5 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Clearly some people are convinced that the JPG image at www.gov.sz constitutes an official specification. A direct link to the JPG image is here: [1].

That JPG image contains decolorized photographs of bits of wood, metal, and plastic. It breaks thousands of years worth of flag traditions and I am even hesitant to call it a flag. The image is not part of an official specification and is not backed up by any decree or legal statute.

If you wish to buy a flag from a reputable flag maker, you are likely going to get yellow arrows and clean blue tassels.

Flagmakers - Eswatini

A similar flag with yellow arrows was used at the 2020 Olympics:

National Geographic article on the 2020 Olympics.

I could say more, but it would just be duplicating what was already written last year on this very talk page. Please read the section above if you have not done so already. MapGrid (talk) 00:22, 6 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Of course that image on the government website is not "a flag". It's a digital image illustrating a flag design, just like this, or this. It's crazy to say that such an illustration breaks thousands of years worth of flag traditions, particularly when many actual historical flag traditions generally treat the artistic style of the charges as flexible, free to change to some extent with method of manufacture as well as artistic taste. At most I'd say that this style is not the one most commonly used to make illustrations of flag designs these days. For that reason (among others), it's good that VexilAlpaca's illustrations are based more on photos of actual flags than one that image.

Apart from that, yes, you're right that there's nothing to suggest that it's got any legal status or intended to be an official specification. It is, however, the way the government chooses to illustrate their flag, and the aspects of it that are consistent with the flags actually seen in government use should be taken seriously. At least, the style/colours VexilAlpaca has modelled their illustration on are definitely within the range of acceptable depictions of the flag design, and arguably the best ones to show in an encyclopedia. At most, if you insist that the two versions count as different flags rather than acceptable variation in a single design (I don't see evidence that the Swati see it that way), then you have to conclude that some reputable flagmakers and the Tokyo games organisers are out of date. JPD (talk) 04:17, 12 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The Flag Did Change[edit]

If you look at the Swazi flag in real life during state visits, the colors are actually lighter and the tassels/ arrows are actually gray. However, the version used on FOTW is not accurate either. If you see flags that look like the current image, they are probably just outdated. Don’t believe me? Here’s some examples:

1. https://www.facebook.com/usembassy.eswatini/photos/a.163598230341655/4588838297817604/?type=3

2. https://thediplomat.com/2021/08/eswatini-taiwans-last-partner-in-africa/

3. https://sz.usembassy.gov/op-ed-working-together-to-combat-covid-19/ 2601:647:4800:5700:6DFB:CAFA:81DC:941 18:35, 22 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]