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The first known use of the Irish tricolour,
which is based on the French national flag, was by Irish nationalists shortly after the French Revolution in 1848.
But it wasn’t until the Easter Rising of 1916, a nationalist uprising against British rule, that the Irish tricolour became widely regarded as the national flag.
In 1922, Ireland was politically partitioned by the British Government into two states, an independent Irish state, called the Irish Free State, which adopted the Irish tricolour and Northern Ireland, the mainly Protestant northeast part of the island, which elected to remain governed by Great Britain.
On the 30th of April 1937, the Eire State was formed and the new constitution officially recognised the tricolour as the country’s national flag.
The flag remained unchanged when the Irish Republic was established on the 18th of April 1949.
The current design dates from the 29th of December 1937.
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