Country

Coat of Arms and Flag of Russia

The national emblem of the Russian Federation is among Europe's most layered heraldic compositions: a golden double-headed eagle charged on its breast with a red shield depicting Saint George the Victorious spearing a black dragon. Paired with the white-blue-red tricolour, these two symbols compress more than five centuries of Muscovite, Imperial, and post-Soviet identity into a single visual grammar.

Flag of Russia

A horizontal tricolour of three equal bands — white, blue, red — in 2:3 proportion. First hoisted on the frigate Oryol in 1668, formalised on Pyotr Velikiy's ships from 1696, codified as the national civil flag by Aleksandr III in 1883, and re-adopted on 22 August 1991 after seven decades of Soviet eclipse.

Coat of Arms of Russia

A golden double-headed eagle on a red field, crowned with three crowns linked by a blue ribbon, holding a sceptre and an orb, and bearing on its breast a red inescutcheon with a silver mounted horseman (traditionally identified as Saint George) slaying a black dragon. Approved by Presidential Decree No. 2050 of 30 November 1993 and codified by Federal Constitutional Law No. 2-FKZ of 25 December 2000.

Quick Facts

Blazon (Formal Heraldic Description)

Gules, a double-headed eagle displayed Or, beaked, langued and armed of the same, crowned with two imperial crowns Or and surmounted of a third and larger crown of the like, all linked by a ribbon Azure; holding in its dexter claw a sceptre Or and in its sinister claw an orb of the same; charged on the breast with an inescutcheon Gules bordered Or, thereon Saint George armoured Argent, mounted upon a horse Argent caparisoned of the same, slaying with a lance Or a dragon Sable overturned.

The blazon is deliberately archaising: it revives Imperial-era forms while omitting the territorial shields and the chain of the Order of Saint Andrew that surrounded the 1882 "Greater Arms."

Tincture Table & Symbolism

Heraldic note — Russia is one of few Christian monarchies whose imperial arms tolerate the placement of metal on metal (the silver horseman and golden lance against the silver dragon's defeat), a licence justified by the antiquity of the composition.

The Double-Headed Eagle: Byzantine Inheritance

The two-headed eagle entered Muscovite heraldry under Ivan III (Ivan Velikiy) in 1497, when it appeared on the reverse of his grand-ducal seal. Two converging factors explain the choice:

1. Marriage to Sophia Palaiologina (1472), niece of the last Byzantine emperor Konstantinos XI, which let Moscow advance a claim as the "Third Rome."
2. Diplomatic alignment with the Holy Roman Empire, whose own black eagle on gold provided a recognisable imperial vocabulary.

The eagle's two heads originally signified the dual gaze of empire — East and West, spiritual and temporal — and were quickly read in Moscow as the union of secular and ecclesiastical authority.

Historical Evolution

1497 — The Seal of Ivan III

The earliest documented appearance: an eagle without crowns, paired on the obverse with the Muscovite horseman (the yezdets) already spearing a serpent — Saint George had not yet been explicitly named.

1547–1584 — Ivan IV "the Terrible"

The eagle gains a single crown and a small breast-shield with the horseman. After Ivan's coronation as Tsar (1547), the iconography acquires explicitly imperial weight.

1667 — The Reforms of Tsar Aleksey I

Aleksey I codifies the arms by decree: three crowns (Kazan, Astrakhan, Siberia), the sceptre and orb in the claws. This is the first formal blazonnement in the Russian tradition.

1721 — Pyotr Velikiy

After proclaiming the Russian Empire, Peter briefly experiments with a Sable-on-Or palette (mirroring the Habsburg pattern) and adds the collar of the Order of Saint Andrew the First-Called around the inescutcheon.

1857–1883 — The Imperial Reform of Bernhard Köhne

Baron Köhne, a Baltic-German herald in tsarist service, produces the Greater, Middle, and Lesser Arms of the Empire — among the most elaborate compositions in European heraldry, surrounded by the shields of all tsarist titles (Poland, Finland, Kazan, Georgia, Siberia, Tauric Chersonese…).

1917–1991 — The Soviet Interregnum

The eagle is abolished. The RSFSR (1918) and later the USSR (1923) adopt the hammer and sickle on a globe, wreathed in wheat, crowned by a red star — a deliberate rupture with monarchical heraldry, though the red field persists in the Soviet flag.

1993 — Restoration

By Yeltsin's Decree No. 2050 (30 November 1993), the double-headed eagle returns, redesigned by Yevgeny Ukhnalyov in a streamlined version of the 1857 arms — without territorial shields, without the Order of Saint Andrew, but with the three historic crowns restored.

2000 — Constitutional Anchoring

Federal Constitutional Law No. 2-FKZ codifies the present blazon and authorises monochrome variants for official documents.

Saint George the Victorious

The mounted saint on the inescutcheon is Saint George (Святой Георгий Победоносец), patron of Moscow since at least the reign of Dmitry Donskoy in the 14th century. Three heraldic details matter:

• The horse faces dexter (the viewer's left) — opposite the Moscow city arms, where the horseman faces sinister. This inversion was a 19th-century Köhne reform that aligned the figure with Western heraldic convention.
• The dragon is overturned (renversé), already vanquished — emphasising triumph rather than combat.
• Saint George is never named in the federal law: the text speaks only of "a horseman slaying a dragon," preserving an ambiguity useful in a multi-confessional federation.

The Flag of Russia — In Detail

Origin

First hoisted, by tradition, on the frigate Oryol in 1668 under Tsar Aleksey I, then formally on Pyotr Velikiy's ships from 1696. Codified as the national civil flag by Aleksandr III in 1883 for the coronation ceremonies. The Bolsheviks abolished it in 1918; it returned during the August coup of 1991 and was constitutionally enshrined by Federal Constitutional Law No. 1-FKZ on 25 December 2000.

Non-official symbolism

No statute fixes the meaning of the colours. Three readings coexist:

The third reading, popular under Imperial pan-Slavism, has been politically sensitive since 1991.

Pan-Slavic family

The white-blue-red sequence inspired most Pan-Slavic flags after the 1848 Prague Congress — compare Slovakia, Slovenia, Serbia, and Croatia, which all reorder the same three tinctures.

Comparative Heraldry

All five share the Byzantine archetype, transmitted through different historical channels: dynastic marriage (Russia), Holy Roman continuity (HRE), Nemanjić Serbia, and the Albanian Kastrioti tradition.

Regional Heraldry of Russia

The federal arms umbrella 85 subjects of the federation, each with its own coat of arms. Click on Russia on the interactive map above to explore the administrative subdivisions, or jump directly to a few notable examples:

• Coat of Arms of Moscow — the prototype for the federal inescutcheon
• Coat of Arms of Saint Petersburg — anchors, sceptre, Imperial maritime symbolism
• Coat of Arms of Tatarstan — the white winged snowy leopard (ak bars)
• Coat of Arms of the Sakha Republic — the rock-art horseman of Shishkino
• Coat of Arms of Chechnya — wolf and mountain iconography

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does the Russian eagle have two heads?

Because it was adopted in 1497 under Ivan III as a deliberate visual claim to Byzantine succession, following his marriage to Sophia Palaiologina, niece of the last East Roman emperor. The two heads symbolise the dual gaze of empire over East and West.

What do the three crowns mean?

Originally the three tsardoms conquered or claimed by Moscow: Kazan, Astrakhan, and Siberia, codified in 1667. Since 1993, the federal law no longer attaches them to specific territories; they signify the sovereignty and unity of the Federation.

Is the horseman officially Saint George?

Not in the constitutional text. Federal Constitutional Law No. 2-FKZ (2000) describes him only as "a silver horseman in a blue cloak slaying with a silver lance a black dragon overturned." The identification with Saint George is traditional and ecclesiastical, not statutory.

Why white-blue-red and not another order?

Pyotr Velikiy chose the sequence in 1696 on the model of Dutch maritime ensigns, which he had studied in Zaandam. The order was confirmed in 1883 and again in 1991.

What replaced the eagle during the Soviet era?

A globe wreathed in wheat, surmounted by the hammer and sickle and a red star, with the motto "Workers of the world, unite!" in the languages of the Soviet republics. The red field of the imperial arms was preserved as the field of the Soviet flag.

Sources & Further Reading

• Federal Constitutional Law No. 2-FKZ of 25 December 2000, "On the State Emblem of the Russian Federation"
• Federal Constitutional Law No. 1-FKZ of 25 December 2000, "On the State Flag of the Russian Federation"
• Soboleva, N. A., Russian State Symbols: History and Modernity, Moscow, 2002
• Vilinbakhov, G. V. (State Hermitage), The State Heraldry of Russia, Saint Petersburg, 2003
• Slater, S., The Complete Book of Heraldry, Lorenz, 2002 — Byzantine eagle chapter

Last reviewed by the Emblema Mundi editorial team on 14 June 2026.

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