What do the flags mean?

The Korean national flag is called Taegukki. The origin comes from the old oriental philosophy called the theory of Um-Yang, in Chinese pronunciation Yin-Yang. Yin means dark and cold, while Yang means bright and hot.

The idea of Yin-Yang is supposed to be originated from the old Korean philosophy of Samshin meaning three
gods. A very old book called Chuyok or Iching in Chinese, which was written by the Chinese several thousands years ago, claims all objects and events in the world are expressed by the movement of yin and yang. For example, the moon is yin while the sun is yang; the earth is yin and the heaven is yang. Yin and yang are opposite and struggle each other while they cooperate in harmony.

The harmonious state of the movement of yin and yang is called Taeguki, or Taikukkki, Taichi in Chinese, which is also the name of the Korean national flag, i.e. Taegukki. Ki means a flag.  The upper half circle, red, of Taeguk means yang and the lower half circle, blue, means yin. They stand for the state of harmony of yin and yang. The symbols, called Kwae, in the four corners, mean the principle of movement and harmony. Basically, each Kwae consists of three bars that can be either broken or
unbroken bars. A broken bar stands for yin while an unbroken bar stands for yang. For example, the upper left Kwae, called Kun, is composed of three solid unbroken bars. And the lower left Kwae, called Yi, is composed of two unbroken bars and one broken bar in between. The more bars you use the more different situation you can express with Kwae. Among so many states of Kwae, i.e. principle of movement of objects and events, four basic Kwae are used in the Korean National Flag. Those are Kun meaning heaven, Yi meaning fire, Kam meaning water, and Kon meaning earth. Each of them symbolises a different state of movement. The white colour of background stands for the peace and the purity of the Korean people who have loved to wear white coloured clothes.

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The flag is normally called the "Union Jack" because it represents a union of countries - England, Ireland, and Scotland and Wales (the flag does not include a flag from Wales because Wales was never ruled in the same way that the other countries were ruled).

The Union Jack/Flag includes the Cross of St. George (England), the Cross of St. Andrew (Scotland) and the Cross of St. Patrick (Ireland).

In 1606, the first flag of Great Britain was developed, which included the crosses of England and Scotland (at this point, Ireland had not been united with England or Scotland).

The red cross (England) had to be put onto the white on blue cross (Scotland), and a white border was added for reasons of heraldry.  This flag was used during the reign of James 1 and Charles 1 (1603-1649), and up until 1801.

In that year, Ireland became united officially with England, so the Nation's flag had to be changed to include the Irish Cross (red diagonal cross on white). The designers had to make sure that all the crosses could be recognised as individual flags as well as being in the same flag together. They did this by making the background white (Scottish Cross) broader on one side of the Irish red than on the other (see picture). This meant that all the separate crosses could be seen and the Irish Cross had it's original white background.

Many other nation's flags have a little Union Jack in the corner of it. This is because that country is probably a member of the
Commonwealth Nations which include: Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, Tuvalu, the state of Hawaii, the Australian States and the three Canadian States.

The Union Jack is the most important of all British symbols, and it is flown by representatives of the United Kingdom all over the world; in the military and the navy, and in royalty.