Araucanía (Chile)

This is a flag that I done some time ago, but waited to publish because I was doing too many posts about Chile. But I think it's a good time to publish what I consider one of my best flags.

Araucanía is an administrative region right on the center of Chile, with a strong relation with native culture. This is Araucanía current flag:

This flag is a blue-white-red tricolor; I really don't know what these colors mean. The shield, however, is interesting: it consists of a black and a red partition, with six white rhombuses, symbols very used in Mapuche art, and a white tapalacucha, a Mapuche neck jewel. The coat of arms is ornamented by a copihue (native flower), a snowy mountains and two araucarias, a common tree in the southern South America and very abundant in the region.

A small change in the flag would be changing the stripes colors by the flag of the Kingdom of Araucanía and Patagonia, a government-in-exile ruled by a French monarch and a council of Mapuche tribal chiefs, but it could generate controversy over non-indigene Chileans.

My proposals is simpler and more effective:

The first and third stripes are taken from region's coat of arms. In central stripe, a stylized araucaria, a symbol with strong local identity. I think it would fly well in Araucanian skies.

Your comment is very welcome!
If you're interested in blog posts, you can receive blog updates on Google Reader or your preference e-mail. Subscription boxes are in the right of the page.