Saint Patrick's Saltire
Saint Patrick's Saltire or Saint Patrick's Cross is a red saltire (X-shaped cross) on a white field. In heraldic language, it may be blazoned argent, a saltire gules. Saint Patrick's Flag (Irish: Bratach Naomh Pádraig) is a flag composed of Saint Patrick's Saltire. The origin of the saltire is disputed. Its association with Saint Patrick dates from the 1780s, when the Anglo-Irish Order of Saint Patrick adopted it as an emblem.[1] This was a British chivalric order established in 1783 by George III. It has been suggested that it derives from the arms of the powerful Geraldine or FitzGerald dynasty.[2][3][dubious – discuss] Some Irish nationalists opposed the usage of the flag to represent Ireland, as they considered it to be a British invention.[2][4]
After its adoption by the Order of Saint Patrick, it began to be used by other institutions. When the Acts of Union 1800 joined the Kingdom of Ireland with the Kingdom of Great Britain, the saltire was added to the British flag to form the Union Flag still used by the United Kingdom. The saltire has occasionally served unofficially to represent Northern Ireland and also appears in some royal events.[5]
Origins
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An early possible mention of a Saint Patrick's flag is from the journal of John Glanville, writing about the Anglo-Dutch fleet that sailed to Cádiz, Spain, in 1625. Lord Delaware deposed in writing to the Lieutenant General about his simple foretop (white, red or blue) precedence flags to be flown:
...That this was an Englishe and not an Irishe action, and the colours contended for the fflagg of St George and not of St Patericke [alluding to whatever the Viscount Valentia was flying], which hee intimated to himselfe being a Baron of England much auntient to my Lord Cromwell (whoe alsoe is a Baron of that Realme) to bee more proper and worthie to carry then anie Irish Viscount...[6]
The Order of Saint Patrick, an Anglo-Irish chivalric order, was created in 1783. The order was a means of rewarding those in high office who supported the Anglo-Irish government of Ireland.[7] On its badge was a red saltire on a white background, which it called the "Cross of St Patrick":
And the said Badge shall be of Gold surrounded with a Wreath of Shamrock or Trefoil, within which shall be a Circle of Gold, containing the Motto of our said Order in Letters of Gold Viz. QUIS SEPARABIT? together with the date 1783, being the year in which our said Order was founded, and encircling the Cross of St Patrick Gules, surmounted with a Trefoil Vert each of its leaves charged with an Imperial Crown Or upon a field of Argent.[8]
The use of a saltire in association with St Patrick was controversial because it differed from the usual crosses by custom worn on St Patrick's Day. In particular, the previous crosses associated with Saint Patrick were not X-shaped. Some contemporary responses to the badge of the order complained that an X-shaped cross was the Cross of St Andrew, patron of Scotland. A February 1783 newspaper complained that "the breasts of Irishmen were to be decorated by the bloody Cross of St Andrew, and not that of the tutelar Saint of their natural isle".[8] Another article claimed that "the Cross of St Andrew the Scotch saint is to honour the Irish order of St Patrick, by being inserted within the star of the order ... a manifest insult to common sense and to national propriety".[8]
An open letter to Lord Temple, to whom the design of the Order of St Patrick's badges were entrusted, echoes this and elaborates:
The Cross generally used on St Patrick's day, by Irishmen, is the Cross pattée, which is small in the centre, and so goes on widening to the ends, which are very broad; this is not recorded as the Irish Cross, but has custom for time immemorial for its support, which is generally allowed as sufficient authority for any similar institution ... As bearing the arms of another person is reckoned very disgraceful by the laws of honour, how much more so is it, in an order which ought to carry honour to the highest pitch, to take a cross for its emblem, which has been acknowledged for many ages as the property of an order in another country? If the cross generally worn as the emblem of the Saint who is ascribed to Ireland is not agreeable to your Excellency, sure many others are left to choose from, without throwing Ireland into so ignominious a point of view, as to adopt the one that Scotland has so long a claim to.[8][disputed – discuss]
Many subsequent commentators believed that the saltire was simply taken from the arms of the FitzGeralds (or "Geraldines"), who were Dukes of Leinster.[2] The Dukes of Leinster dominated the political and social scene of 18th-century Dublin, from their ducal palace of Leinster House (later to become the seat of the Irish parliament and senate, the Oireachtas).[9] William FitzGerald, 2nd Duke of Leinster was the premier peer in the Irish House of Lords and a founder member of the Order of Saint Patrick. On the other hand, Michael Casey suggests that Lord Temple, pressed for time, had based the Order's insignia on those of the Order of the Garter, and simply rotated its St George's Cross 45 degrees.[10]
Henry Gough in 1893 doubted the antiquity of Patrick's Cross on the basis that, if a cross had been an established symbol of Ireland during the Protectorate, then flags of the era would have used that instead of the gold Irish harp.[11]
Earlier use of saltires in an Irish context
[edit]A variety of sources show saltires in use earlier than 1783 in Ireland and in an Irish context, although there is no suggestion that they are linked to St Patrick. The Flag Institute states that arms derive from those of the powerful FitzGerald dynasty (or "Geraldines"), who were Earls of Kildare (and later Dukes of Leinster).[12] Gearóid Mór FitzGerald and his son Gearóid Óg were also Lord Deputies of Ireland in the late 15th and early 16th centuries.
The design on the reverse of some