Family research · Phase 13 of the world atlas

Flags of Namibia

Namibia's colonial history includes one of the 20th century's first documented genocides: the German colonial administration's 1904–08 campaign against the Herero and Nama peoples, in which tens of thousands died in massacres, forced marches into the desert, and concentration camps. German rule ended in 1915, but Namibia did not become independent until 1990 — three-quarters of a century later, after decades of South African administration, including direct apartheid-era rule, and a long armed liberation struggle.

Scope of this page: the lands of present-day Namibia, from Herero, Nama, and Ovambo societies through German and South African rule to the modern republic. Part of a larger atlas — see the linked pages at the bottom.

Namibia's own border, four rulers — and one carve-out

Namibia's own real border, traced whole, with one internal carve-out: Ovamboland, the far-north home of the Ondonga and other Aawambo kingdoms, which stayed largely outside direct German control while the rest of the territory was administered as German South-West Africa. Press play, or drag the slider, to watch who held it, era to era.

German rule never actually reached the far north. Unlike Nigeria's briefly separate Northern and Southern protectorates, German and South African rule mostly governed the territory as one unit — but not entirely: the Aawambo kingdoms of Ovamboland, including the long-reigning Ondonga kingdom, remained largely outside direct German administration through the whole 1884–1915 colonial period. The border below only solidifies for the span the two pieces were genuinely governed apart.

1990–present

Republic of Namibia (independent)

Real traced coastline and border; the Ovamboland carve-out in the far north is schematic and approximate, not a surveyed boundary — see the rule box above for why it's shown.

blue-red-green diagonal with a gold sun, current flag since 1990

1990 – present

Republic of Namibia (independent)

Republic, independentSam NujomaSecular (no state religion)

Migration & conquest:Immigration: return of SWAPO exiles (1989–90)

Who & why: after a UN-supervised transition and elections won by SWAPO (the South West Africa People's Organisation, which had led the armed liberation struggle since the 1960s), Namibia becomes independent on 21 March 1990 under founding president Sam Nujoma — the last African territory to gain independence from colonial and settler rule (excluding Eritrea's later 1993 separation from Ethiopia).

What it represents: blue for the sky and Atlantic Ocean, red for the people and their heroism, green for vegetation and agriculture, white for peace and unity, and the gold sun for life and energy — a design that deliberately breaks from both the German and South African flags that preceded it.

Paint guide

Proportions2:3.

LayoutDiagonal split, blue upper-hoist and green lower-fly, white-bordered red diagonal band, gold sun in the upper hoist.

Blue#003580

Red#D21034

Green#009543

Gold#FFCE00

South Africa's own orange-white-blue flag, flown administratively over the territory

1915 – 1990

South West Africa (South African mandate, then occupation)

Colony/occupation (contested)Louis BothaNo official state religion (Dutch Reformed Church influential)

Migration & conquest:Immigration: South African settlers (apartheid land allocation)Emigration: SWAPO exiles fleeing occupation (1966–90)

Who & why: South African forces occupy German South-West Africa in 1915 during the First World War, and South Africa is granted a League of Nations mandate over the territory in 1920. Rather than preparing it for self-government, South Africa administers it as a de facto fifth province, extending its own apartheid laws there after 1948. The United Nations formally revokes South Africa's mandate in 1966, but South Africa refuses to withdraw, continuing what the UN and International Court of Justice both deem an illegal occupation through a long, bitterly fought SWAPO-led liberation war (the Namibian War of Independence, 1966–1990) before finally agreeing to a UN-supervised transition to independence.

What it represents: South Africa administers the territory under its own national flag throughout this entire seven-decade span; no distinct South West African territorial flag is adopted.

Paint guide

Proportions2:3.

LayoutHorizontal tricolor, orange-white-blue (South Africa's 1928–1994 national flag).

Orange#FF6B00

White#FFFFFF

Blue#002395

the German imperial colonial ensign flown over South-West Africa

1884 – 1915

German South-West Africa

Colony (genocide)Otto von BismarckLutheran Christianity (imperial state church, no colonial establishment)

Migration & conquest:Immigration: German settlers (from 1884)Emigration: Herero survivors fleeing to Bechuanaland (1904–08)

Ruling house:House of MahareroHouse of WitbooiOndonga Kingdom

Who & why: Germany declares a protectorate over the territory in 1884. When the Herero and later the Nama rise up against German land seizures and abuses in 1904, colonial commander Lothar von Trotha issues an explicit extermination order; German forces drive Herero communities into the Omaheke desert to die of thirst and starvation, and survivors of both peoples are confined in concentration camps marked by forced labor, starvation, and high death rates. Estimates commonly cited suggest that roughly 65,000 of an estimated 80,000 Herero and around 10,000 of 20,000 Nama died between 1904 and 1908 — widely recognized today as the 20th century's first genocide, a fact this atlas states plainly given how well documented it is. Germany formally acknowledged the genocide in 2021.

What it represents: the black-white-red horizontal tricolor of the German Empire's civil ensign, flown as the colonial flag across all German protectorates including South-West Africa.

Paint guide

Proportions3:5.

LayoutHorizontal tricolor, black-white-red.

Black#000000

White#FFFFFF

Red#C8102E

placeholder maroon field — Herero, Nama, and Ovambo societies, no flag survives

pre-1884

Herero, Nama, Ovambo, and San societies

Pre-colonial societiesNo single ruler documentedIndigenous belief systems (no unified state religion)

Migration & conquest:Immigration: Oorlam migration from the Cape (1820s–40s)

Ruling house:House of MahareroHouse of WitbooiOndonga Kingdom

Who & why: before German colonization, the territory is home to the pastoralist Herero, the Nama (Khoikhoi-descended pastoralists), the agricultural Ovambo peoples of the north, and San hunter-gatherer communities, organized in clan- and chieftaincy-based structures rather than a single centralized state.

What it represents: no securely documented flag survives from this pre-colonial era for any of these peoples; shown here honestly blank rather than invented.

Paint guide

ProportionsN/A — no attested flag.

Reading the tags

Pre-colonial societies — no centralized crown

Colony (genocide) — German rule marked by the 1904–08 Herero and Nama genocide

Colony/occupation (contested) — South African rule, later ruled illegal by the UN

Republic, independent — sovereign statehood

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 Namibia 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 Namibia →

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 Central & Southern Africa hubFourteen countries, Congo basin to the Cape