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The flag of the People's Republic of China () is a red field charged in the canton (upper corner nearest the flagpole) with five golden stars. The design features one large star, with four smaller stars in a semicircle set off towards the fly (the side farthest from the flag pole). The red represents the communist revolution; the five stars and their relationship represent the unity of the Chinese people under the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Sometimes, the flag is referred to as the "Five-star Red Flag" (). The flag was designed by Zeng Liansong, a citizen from Wenzhou, Zhejiang. He designed it in response to a circular distributed by the Preparatory Committee of the New Political Consultative Conference (新政治協商會議籌備會, ''Xīn zhèngzhì xiéshāng huìyì chóubèi huì'') in July 1949, shortly after they came to power following the Chinese Civil War. The design competition received 2,992 (or 3,012, see below) entries, and Zeng's design was put into a pool of 38 finalists. After several meetings and slight modifications, Zeng's design was chosen as the national flag. The first flag was hoisted by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) on a pole overlooking Beijing's Tiananmen Square on October 1, 1949, at a ceremony announcing the founding of the People's Republic. Other flags used in the People's Republic of China use a red background to symbolize the revolution in conjunction with other symbols. The flag of the PLA uses the gold star with the Chinese characters 8-1 (for August 1, the date of the PLA's founding). The flag of the Communist Party of China replaces all of the stars with the party emblem. Due to government regulations, cities and provinces of China cannot have their own flags; the only sub-national flags that exist are those of the Hong Kong and Macau Special Administrative Regions. Despite this, at least two cities have adopted flags after the law was passed. The cities of Kaifeng and Shangrao adopted their flags in March 2006 and March 2009 respectively. This implies that the law is either repealed or not enforced. == History of the design == On July 4, 1949, the sixth working group of the Preparatory Committee of the New Political Consultative Conference (新政治協商會議籌備會, PCNPCC) created a notice to submit designs for the national flag. After a few changes, the notice was published in the papers ''People's Daily'', ''Beiping Liberation News'', ''Xinmin News'', ''Dazhong Daily'', ''Guangming Daily'', ''Jinbu Daily'' and ''Tianjin Daily'' during a period between July 15–26. The list requirements for the national flag were also posted in the notice: # Chinese characteristics (Geography, nationality, history, culture, etc.) # Power characteristics (A people's democratic government, led by the working class and based on the worker-peasant alliance.) # The shape should be rectangular and the length-breadth ratio should be 3:2 # The colour should mainly be bright red(an early draft of the notice had the colour at dark red, but was changed to bright red by Zhou Enlai).〔 Zeng Liansong was working in Shanghai at the time the announcement came out; he wanted to create a flag design to express his patriotic enthusiasm for the new country. In the middle of July, he sat down in his attic for multiple nights to come up with designs. His inspiration for the current design comes from the stars shining in the night sky. He thought of a Chinese proverb "longing for the stars, longing for the moon," (盼星星盼月亮, ''Pàn xīngxīng pàn yuèliàng'') which shows yearning. Later, he realized that the CPC was the great savior (大救星, ''Dà jiùxīng'') of the Chinese people, being represented by a larger star. The idea of four small stars came from On the People's Democratic Dictatorship a speech by Mao Zedong, which defined the Chinese people as consisting of four social classes. Yellow also implies that China belongs to the Chinese people, a "yellow race".〔 After working out the details of the placement of the stars and their sizes (he had tried to put all of the stars in the center, but believed it would be too heavy and dull), he sent his "Five Stars on a Field of Red" (紅地五星旗, ''Hóng dì wǔxīng qí'') design to the committee in the middle of August.〔〔 As of August 20, a total of 2,992 (or 3,012) designs were sent to the flag committee, which included input from committee members themselves, such as Guo Moruo and Tan Kah Kee. From August 16 to 20, the designs were viewed at the Beijing Hotel and culled down to a list of 38.〔〔 These designs are collected into a book named ''A Reference of National Flag Designs'' (國旗圖案參考資料). This book was then submitted to the newly established Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) for further discussion. However, Zeng's design wasn't included until Tian Han nominated it again. In the morning of September 23, the representatives of the CPPCC discussed the national flags, but came to no conclusion. Some didn't like the symbolism which Zeng attached to the four smaller stars, and said it shouldn't include the bourgeoisie. The design Mao and others liked had a giant golden star in the corner on a red flag that was charged with a golden horizontal bar. But this design was strongly opposed by Zhang Zhizhong due to the golden bar symbolizing the tearing apart of the revolution and the country. In the night, Peng Guanghan (彭光涵) recommended Zeng's design to Zhou Enlai, Zhou was satisfied with it and asked for a larger copy of the design to be made. Tan Kah Kee also gave his advice to Mao and Zhou that the power characteristics are more important than Chinese geography characteristics, so there's no need to insist on the golden bar which stands for the Yellow River. Two days later, Mao had a meeting in his office about the flag. He persuaded everyone to adopt Zeng's design, with some slight modifications. According to earlier discussions at the Beijing Hotel, the hammer and sickle from Zeng's original design was removed since it was similar to the Flag of the Soviet Union.〔 On September 27, 1949, Zeng's modified design was selected unanimously by the First Plenary Session of CPPCC, which changed the flag's name to "Five-star Red Flag".〔 On September 29, the new flag was published in the People's Daily, so the design could be copied by other local authorities. The flag was officially unveiled in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on October 1, 1949, the formal announcement of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The first flag flown over Tiananmen Square was sewn together by Zhao Wenrei (赵文瑞), a seamstress who finished the task around 1 PM on September 30. Zeng had a hard time believing that his design was picked, due to the missing hammer and sickle from the giant star. However, he was officially congratulated by the General Office of the People's Government as the designer of the flag and received 5 million yuan for his work. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Flag of China」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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