Union Jack

[Isobel]

How did the union jack get its name

[Ewood27]

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, "The Union Jack is formal the Union Flag when it is shown on a ship, or informal the flag of Great Britain." A 'jack' is a naval term for a national flag flown from a ship. The word has simply come ashore into general use.

[allen ives]

'Union' jack, or flag, came into circulation after the Act of Union with Ireland, (1802??) bringing together England, Scotland, and Ireland, for the first time. (Wales wasn't involved as we'd already driven out the natives and given it the title of 'principality' some centuries earlier).

[incitatus]

1702 for the first act of union in queen annes time, no? the union flag had several incarnations while we added on the other bits. Sadly we didnt drive the natives out of Wales we just murdered their aristocracy and took it over. The natives were left to commune with their sheep. The Welsh themselves called it a prinicpality....Llewellyn the Last was a Prince, not a king.

[allen ives]

xrefer, the online encycl, gives the following:

Union Jack

(also Union flag) the national flag or ensign of the United Kingdom (formerly of Great Britain). (See below.)

This flag (originally and more properly the Union flag) was formed by combining the crosses of the three patron saints St George, St Andrew, and St Patrick, retaining the blue ground of the banner of St Andrew. The flags of St George and St Andrew were first combined to symbolize the union of the crowns of England and Scotland (1603), the cross of St Patrick being added on the union of the Parliaments of Great Britain and Ireland (1801). Originally the term Union Jack denoted a small British Union flag flown as the jack of a ship, in later and more extended use coming to denote any size or adaptation of the Union flag.

Sorry about the Welsh business, inkie. Didn't they once call themselves a kingdom? And I think it was 1707 for the final act of union with the Scots...

[firefly]

There were quite a few Kingdoms in Britian, including Wessex and Cornwall, and Scotland of course, but I don't believe Wales was one of them.