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The Vergina Sun, designated as an official national symbol by the Hellenic Parliament since February 1993, appears on the (unofficial) flag of Greek Macedonia. The symbol was introduced in Greece as popular imagery from the mid-1980s, and after 1991, increasingly so in many new contexts in Greece.
The flag of Macedonia (Greek: Σημαία της Μακεδονίας) represents a Vergina Sun with 16 rays in the centre of a blue field. This flag, as well as the Vergina Sun, is commonly used as an unofficial symbol of the Greek region of Macedonia and its subdivisions .
The symbol was discovered in the present-day Greek region of Macedonia, and Greeks regard it as an exclusively Greek symbol. The Vergina Sun on a red field was the first flag of the Republic of Macedonia until it was removed under an agreement reached between the Republic of Macedonia and Greece in September 1995.
Between 1822 and 1978, this flag was flown on Greek vessels and also used for foreign service. In 1978, it was established as the sole National Flag of Greece, and as the war and civil Ensign, and has been used in that capacity ever since. Nine horizontal stripes of equal width; five blue alternating with four white.
The flag depicted the "Vergina Sun" symbol, a stylised yellow sun centred on a red field with eight main and eight secondary rays emanating from the sun, each tapering to a point. This ancient symbol was named after the Greek town where it had been discovered in archaeological excavations of the ancient Macedonian city of Aigai.
One of the most recognisable and beloved Greek symbols, the double-headed eagle, is not a part of the modern Greek flag or coat of arms (although it is officially used by the Greek Army, the Church of Greece, the Cypriot National Guard and the Church of Cyprus, and was incorporated in the Greek coat of arms in 1926 [8]).