Last modified: 2003-09-13 by joe mcmillan
Keywords: militia | color | standard | dragoons | infantry | minas gerais | para | colonial |
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by Joseph McMillan
The oldest colonial military flag shown in Cl&ocute;vis Ribeiro's Brazões e bandeiras do Brasil is the standard of the Regimento dos Dragões Reaes das Minas (Minas Royal Dragoons), a militia unit from Minas Gerais, dated 1720. Ribeiro describes his illustration as a reconstruction. The flag is gyronny of eight, red and yellow, with a wide counterchanged border. On the center is a device showing an arm issuing from a cloud, the hand grasping a bolt of lightning. Above this emblem is a blue scroll inscribed Cædere aut cædi. Below the emblem is another blue scroll inscribed with the name of the regiment. The initials of the regiment, DRM, royally crowned, appear in gold in each corner. The flag is trimmed on all four sides by a narrow strip of gold lace and on the upper, lower, and fly edges by gold fringe. Joseph McMillan, 16 April 2003