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Jaroslaw city (Poland)

Jarosław county, Podkarpackie vojvodship

image by Chrystian Kretowicz, 24 Oct 2008
adopted 27 Aug 2001

Jarosław city flag
Jarosław city Coat of Arms

See also:

Jarosław city flag

Jarosław - urban commune, Jarosław County, Podkarpackie Voivodship.
The city was established by the Ukrainian prince Yaroslav the Wise in the 11th century. It was granted Magdeburg rights by Polish prince Władysław Opolczyk in 1375. The city quickly developed as important trade centre and a port on the San river, reaching the period of its greatest prosperity in 16th and 17th century, with trade routes linking Silesia with Ruthenia and Gdańsk with Hungary coming through it and merchants from such distant countries as Spain, England, Finland, Armenia and Persia arriving at the annual three week long fair on the feast of the Assumption. In 1574 a Jesuit college was established in Jarosław.
In the 1590s Tatars from the Ottoman Empire pillaged the surrounding countryside. (See Moldavian Magnate Wars, The Magnate Wars (1593-1617), Causes.) They were unable to overcome the city's fortifications, but their raids started to diminish the city's economic strength and importance.
Outbreaks of bubonic plague in the 1620s and the Swedish Deluge in 1655-60 further undermined its prominence. In the Great Northern War of 1700-21 the region was repeatedly pillaged by Russian, Saxon and Swedish armies, causing the city to decline further.
Jarosław was under Austrian rule from the First Partition of Poland in 1772 until Poland regained independence in 1918. After the 2nd World War the city remained part of Poland. Poland's communist government expelled most of Jarosław's Ukrainian population, at first to Soviet territories and later to territories transferred from Germany to Poland in 1944-45.

Arms were originally bestowed by the Imperial (Austrian) decree in 1845. Re-adopted on August 27, 2001 (resolution # 501/XXXIV/2001) together with the flag
and confirmed on August 28, 2006 (resolution # 733/LXI/06).
"Arms: a crowned blue shield portraying the city's defensive wall with two towers (all silver-white).
From the windows of the towers two red-silver flags are hanging. The wall has an open gate.
Below the wall there is a river and a boat on it with white sail and flying red-silver pennant. Banks of the river are green.
Flag: A red over silver horizontal bi-color."

In September 2008, Mr.Alfred Znamierowski was invited to Jaroslaw and asked to re-design its Coat of Arms and flag. Mr.Znamierowski intends to keep the Coat of Arms as true as possible while modernizing some aspects of it. His idea of a new flag provides an addition of the blue, vertical band at the hoist, with the new Coat of Arms being placed there, and retaining the red and white horizontal bands.
The project, when finished, will be submitted to the Heraldic Commission, of which Mr.Znamierowski is a member.
Chrystian Kretowicz, 24 Oct 2008

Jarosław city Coat of Arms

image by Chrystian Kretowicz, 24 Oct 2008
adopted 1845