Bathed in Blood: Austria and Latvia

The Danish flag and the Austrian flag were adopted in the 1200s, and depending on your sources, one was before the other. One thing not in confusion, though, is that Denmark has been using the flag continuously since then, whereas the Austrians have had a number of alternate banners over the years of Hapsburg and Nazi rulers. Denmark has the record for continuously flying the same flag. But this isn't abut them. This is about Austria and Latvia.

Austria's name in its own language, German, is Oesterreich, or, Kindom of the Oesters. (Note: I'm using "Oe" instead of "O-umlaut" because I don't have that symbol here.) The Oesters were a German tribe like the Weimar and the Bavarians and the Franks. Hell, Frankreich is the German for their country (in English we call that country France). In modern Oesterreich, though, things are changing and becoming more modern. The habit most recently has been to refer to themselves as Austrians and not Oesterreichere, as well as referring to the country using the English word, Austria. Even the internet country code for Austria is .at.

In any case, Wien, the capitol city of the Oesters kingdom---a city we know today as Vienna, the lengthening due to the German accent the Oesters have, stretching words with a drawl---was the center for music and art in Europe for centuries after the Renaissance and before the outbreak of WWI.

But the history of the kingdom is a bloody one of clan warfare and eventual unification in the mountains east of the Bavarian Black Forest and the Swiss Alps and south of Bohemia. That's where this flag was born:

The first triband, we see this Austrian flag above. Red-white-red. The history of the banner is that the king, after a particularly brutal and bloody battle, took off his belt and exposed the still-white fabric underneath. The blood having stained above and below, the white glowed in the sun after a victorious battle.

Awesome and gruesome.

Hey look, the king's spent all day hacking people to death with a broadsword, and his bloody tunic looks awesome!

The Latvian flag has a few theories about it's origins, one of which being a very similar story to the battle-stained and battle-pure sectional clothing article the Austrians use. Considering how much blood was spilled in determining the borders of European countries, I don't think this is outside the realm of possibility.

There are a few differences, though:

The Latvian flag has red bands that are both twice as thick as the white band, and the color is a darker red, a maroon. Actually, I heard that it's called "Latvian red". The thickness and the color change were specifically augured to distinguish it from the Austrians, as it was adopted much, much later.