Flags with the Sun

About Sun

The sun is one of the oldest symbols used in human heraldry, and it appears on national flags for two main reasons: cosmic universality and political iconography. The Japanese hinomaru shows a single red disc representing the rising sun and gives the country its name, “the land of the rising sun.” In Latin America, the Sun of May — a stylized human-faced sun — commemorates the May Revolution of 1810 and appears on the flags of Argentina and Uruguay. African and Pacific flags often use a rayed sun to symbolize a new dawn of independence: Kiribati, the Philippines, North Macedonia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Namibia, Malawi, and Rwanda all carry suns. Each country styles its sun differently — number of rays, presence of a face, color and position — but the underlying message is consistent: light, life, and a fresh beginning.