Family research · Phase 8 of the world atlas

Flags of Egypt

Egypt is the deepest lineage in this entire atlas: Pharaonic civilization along the Nile runs back some three thousand years before any of this page's flags existed, through Persian, Greek (Ptolemaic), and Roman rule, the Arab-Islamic conquest, a long Ottoman period, Muhammad Ali's 19th-century modernizing dynasty, British occupation, and finally a republic that briefly tried to unite the wider Arab world under one flag. This page necessarily compresses antiquity into a single honest bridging entry before the historical record allows real flag-by-flag detail.

Gamal Abdel Nasser's 1952 republic pursued pan-Arabism aggressively — nationalizing the Suez Canal in 1956, triggering the Suez Crisis, and briefly merging Egypt's own statehood into unions with Syria and then Syria and Libya together, each with its own shared flag, before settling into the red-white-black tricolor Egypt still flies today.

Scope of this page: the lands of present-day Egypt, antiquity–present, seven political entities. Part of a larger atlas — see the linked pages at the bottom.

One border, seven eras

Egypt's own real border, traced whole. Press play, or drag the slider, across seven eras from antiquity's unrecorded dynasties to the modern republic.

Egypt is the one country in this batch that genuinely tempted a real internal split — and still doesn't get one here. Ancient Egypt's Upper/Lower divide (the white Hedjet and red Deshret crowns, united in the Pschent) is real and well documented, but it belongs to the pre-flag antiquity spanned by this page's single bridging entry, and it already has its own dedicated page — Flags of Ancient Egypt — covering that crown iconography in full. Every era actually itemized on this page's own timeline, from the Arab conquest onward, governed a unified Egypt; there's no genuine split within the eras tracked here to carve out honestly.

Antiquity

Pharaonic, Persian, Greek & Roman Egypt

Real traced border (johan/world.geo.json, EGY), no internal partition — see the rule box above for why.

red-white-black tricolor, golden Eagle of Saladin — the current flag

1984 – present

Arab Republic of Egypt (modern)

Republic, independentHosni MubarakIslam (constitutional state religion)

Migration & conquest:Emigration: labor migration to the Gulf (1970s–)Immigration: Syrian refugees (2011–)Immigration: Sudanese refugees (2003–, 2023–)

Who & why: after the Federation of Arab Republics dissolves and Egypt signs the 1979 peace treaty with Israel following the 1973 war, the current national emblem — the golden Eagle of Saladin, a symbol tracing back to the historic Arab liberation flag — is formally fixed to the flag's center in 1984, replacing the earlier hawk of Quraish design.

What it represents: the red-white-black horizontal tricolor, in continuous use in some form since the 1952 revolution, now carries the golden Eagle of Saladin, holding a scroll inscribed with the republic's name.

Paint guide

Proportions2:3.

LayoutHorizontal tricolor: red, white, black; golden Eagle of Saladin centered on the white band.

Red#CE1126

White#F4EFE1

Black#1A1A1A

Gold eagle#C9A13C

the republic's tricolor, changing emblem through two pan-Arab unions

1953 – 1984

Republic of Egypt / United Arab Republic / Federation of Arab Republics

Republic, independentGamal Abdel NasserIslam (constitutional state religion)

Migration & conquest:Emigration: Jewish community expelled/emigrates (1956–)Emigration: British & French nationals expelled (1956)

Who & why: the Free Officers' 1952 revolution, led by Gamal Abdel Nasser, ends the monarchy and declares a republic in June 1953. Nasser's pan-Arabism produces the 1958–1961 United Arab Republic with Syria (two green stars on the tricolor) and, after Syria's withdrawal, the 1972–1977 Federation of Arab Republics with Libya and Syria (a golden hawk of Quraish). Nasser's nationalization of the Suez Canal in 1956 triggers the Suez Crisis, a defining confrontation with Britain, France, and Israel that Egypt, backed by US and Soviet pressure, wins politically.

What it represents: the red-white-black tricolor, adopted at the republic's founding, keeps its structure through both pan-Arab unions while its central emblem changes twice to mark each new political arrangement — shown here as one bridging entry across a genuinely fast-moving 31 years.

Paint guide

Proportions2:3.

LayoutHorizontal tricolor: red, white, black; central emblem changes by sub-period (eagle 1953–58, two green stars 1958–72, golden hawk 1972–84).

Red#CE1126

White#F4EFE1

Black#1A1A1A

green field, white crescent and three stars — the Kingdom of Egypt

1922 – 1953

Kingdom of Egypt

Kingdom, nominal/full independenceKing Fuad IIslam (constitutional state religion)

Migration & conquest:Occupied by: Britain (continuing)

Ruling house:Muhammad Ali dynasty

Who & why: Britain unilaterally declares Egypt nominally independent in 1922, with Sultan Fuad I becoming King, though British forces and advisors retain substantial real influence, especially over the Suez Canal Zone and foreign policy, until the 1936 Anglo-Egyptian Treaty narrows that role. The monarchy is abolished by the Free Officers' revolution in 1953.

What it represents: a new flag adopted at nominal independence in 1922 — green field, white crescent, three white stars representing Egypt, Nubia, and Sudan under one crown — replacing the Khedivate's earlier red banner.

Paint guide

Proportions2:3.

LayoutGreen field, white crescent, three white five-pointed stars.

Green#0B6E3F

White#F4EFE1

red field, white crescent and three stars — Muhammad Ali's dynasty, later occupied

1805 – 1922

Muhammad Ali dynasty / Khedivate of Egypt

Autonomous / occupiedMuhammad AliSunni Islam

Migration & conquest:Occupied by: Britain (1882–)Immigration: European & Levantine communities (19th c.)

Ruling house:Muhammad Ali dynasty

Who & why: Muhammad Ali, an Ottoman-Albanian officer, seizes power in 1805 and founds a dynasty that modernizes Egypt's military, economy, and infrastructure while remaining a nominal Ottoman vassal, raised to the autonomous title "Khedive" in 1867. Egypt's mounting debt from the Suez Canal (opened 1869) and other projects gives Britain the pretext to occupy the country militarily in 1882, though nominal Khedivate sovereignty continues under British control until 1914.

What it represents: the Khedivate's own red flag, with a white crescent and three stars, formalized in 1881 and continuing to fly, largely unchanged, straight through the start of the British occupation the following year.

Paint guide

ProportionsNo fixed ratio for most of this period; 1881 flag roughly 2:3.

LayoutRed field, white crescent and (from 1881) three white stars.

Red#A4302A

White#F4EFE1

Ottoman red, white crescent and star — provincial Egypt

1517 – 1805

Ottoman Egypt

Ottoman provinceSelim ISunni Islam (Ottoman)

Migration & conquest:Conquered by: Ottoman Empire (1517)

Who & why: the Ottoman Sultan Selim I defeats the Mamluk Sultanate at the Battle of Ridaniya in 1517, absorbing Egypt as an Ottoman province called an eyalet, though Mamluk beys continue to hold substantial local power under nominal Ottoman governors for most of this nearly three-century span.

What it represents: the standard Ottoman red field with white crescent and star, flown across this and other Ottoman provinces of the era.

Paint guide

ProportionsNo fixed ratio recorded for this era.

LayoutRed field, white crescent and five-pointed star.

Red#A4302A

White#F4EFE1

placeholder maroon field — Arab-Islamic caliphates and sultanates

642 – 1517

Arab-Islamic Egypt: caliphates to Mamluks

Successive caliphates/sultanatesCaliph Umar ibn al-KhattabSunni Islam (ruling establishment)

Migration & conquest:Conquered by: Rashidun Caliphate (642)

Ruling house:Ayyubid dynasty

Who & why: the Rashidun Arab conquest of Byzantine Egypt completes in 642, beginning nearly nine centuries under Umayyad, Abbasid, Tulunid, Ikhshidid, Fatimid (who found Cairo in 969 as their capital), Ayyubid (founded by Saladin), and finally Mamluk rule — a slave-soldier military caste that rules as sultans and repels the Mongols at Ain Jalut in 1260, until Ottoman conquest in 1517.

What it represents: no single flag can honestly represent nearly nine centuries and at least six distinct ruling dynasties across this territory; heraldic banners of this era are poorly and inconsistently attested. Shown here honestly blank rather than invented.

Paint guide

ProportionsN/A — no single attested flag across this span.

placeholder maroon field — Pharaonic through Roman antiquity

Antiquity – 642

Pharaonic, Persian, Greek & Roman Egypt

AntiquityNarmerAncient Egyptian polytheism, later Christianity

Migration & conquest:Conquered by: Achaemenid Persia (525 BC)Conquered by: Rome (30 BC)

Who & why: Egypt is one of the world's oldest continuous civilizations, its unified Pharaonic state dating back roughly five thousand years, followed by Achaemenid Persian conquest (525 BC), Alexander the Great and the Greek Ptolemaic dynasty (323–30 BC, ending with Cleopatra VII), and then nearly seven centuries as a province of Rome and, later, the Byzantine Empire, until the Arab conquest of 642.

What it represents: flags as a heraldic device do not exist in this period; ancient Egypt used standards, banners, and royal insignia (such as the crook and flail, or Pharaonic double crown) rather than territorial flags in the modern sense. Shown here honestly blank rather than invented, standing in for millennia of civilization this atlas cannot reduce to a single painted banner.

Paint guide

ProportionsN/A — no flags existed as a heraldic form in this era.

Reading the tags

Antiquity / successive dynasties — no single flag

Ottoman province / autonomous — under or loosely under the Sultan

Kingdom / Republic, independent — sovereign under its own government

Leader — the named ruler most associated with the era's start

State religion — the official/established faith, not the population's

Find the records

Family history research for Egypt lives in a different project, Record Atlas, which maps which archive actually holds the paper for a given place and era.

Search Record Atlas for Egypt →

More of the atlas

This page is one lineage in a larger set. See the region-wide hub and the other countries here:

Flags Atlas indexSearch every country and hub Maghreb & Nile hubSix countries, fourteen centuries