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Stará Lysá (Czech Republic)

Nymburk okres, Central Bohemian region

Last modified: 2011-05-27 by andrew weeks
Keywords: stara lysa |
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[Stará Lysá flag] by Jarig Bakker, 18 May 2004
adopted 9 Dec 2002 See also:

Stará Lysá flag

Image after Petr Exner's Vexilologický Lexikon prapory obcí ČR (2002) - Stará Lysá, Nymburk district, Central Bohemian region - adopted 9 Dec 2002 - the red field with its charge is identical to that of the flag of Rozhovice, Chrudim district.
Jarig Bakker, 18 May 2004

What does the black and yellow quartered flag on this central panel represent?
James Dignan, 7 Jun 2004

Stara Lysa Flag looks familiar to me (although I didn't  see it before). Such lion with quartered banner was part of the Arms of an interesting personage, called Count Franz Anton Sporck.
His ancestor Johann was a tall and strong man of ordinary origin (his father was a farmer - it is said), who entered in 16-th Cent the Army of Catholic League, fought in the Battle at White Mountain  (1620- Bílá Hora), where the Bohemian States Uprising  was defeated by Hapsburgs. And Johann  Sporck was 1647 made Fortune in Thirty-years War,  was promoted to Imperial Colonel, a Baron (Freiherr) and the Emperor gave a great estate in middle Bohemia on Elbe (Labe) River. 1664 he became Count. Above mentioned Franz Anton (1694 - 1738), Johann's son,  was "a friend of Arts and Sciences". In Lysá nad Labem (not in Stará Lysá) he had founded a picture gallery and great library. In Kuks next to Dvůr Králové he had established beautiful complex of Spa, Chateau, Hospital, Church and Park with many valuable baroque statues. He was fond of hunting and founded on his own so called "St. Hubert Order" (not to be confused with Bavarian Order of simillar name),  which he had
conferred personally to the Emperor Karl VI, when he was in Bohemia. This event is to our days represented by a beautiful baroque monument in a wood near Hlavenec (MB). The coat of arms of Hlavenec is remembering this event too. One of Sporck's hunting lodges called "Mon Repos" is in the wood in neighbourhood of Stará Lysá.
Full arms of Sporck family is just from the moment of Imperial and Royal Grant quite complicated: Quaterly 1. a 4. Or a Double-headed Eagle Sable crowned  of the first, 2. a 3. the lion with flag - but standing on a tripple hill Vert (sometimes without hills) and in escutcheon Azure (crowned by Counts Coronet) a Turk's head in Turban, erased, proper.  The crest is the eagle from the first field. The other crests are: peacock feathers, lion with flag, whole Turkish officer with sceptre downwards and an armded hand with sword. The family died out in the beginning of the last century and no other member of the family was so interresting like Franz Anton (František Antonín) was.
Allready in the Year 1718 a family Swéerts ( of Flemish origin) received the right to add escutcheon with Turk's head to Family Arms and the right to change the name. The are known from that year as Counts Swéerts-Sporck.
It is more then probable the lion with black and golden flag is a sign from Spork's Arms, because Stará Lysá is in former Sporck's estate.
Ales Křížan, 8 Jun 2004