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Tres Cantos (Municipality, Community of Madrid, Spain)

Last modified: 2016-05-23 by ivan sache
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[Flag]

Flag of Tres Cantos - Image by Ivan Sache, 30 July 2015


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Presentation of Tres Cantos

The municipality of Tres Cantos (42,546 inhabitants in 2014; 3,793 ha) is located 20 km north of Madrid.

Tres Cantos was established in 1974 by the Instituto Nacional de Urbanismo (INRU), on a 1,692 ha plot that had been expropriated in 1971. The Tres Cantos SA semi-public company was set up to organize the new settlement, jointly with the municipality of Colmenar Viejo. First settled in 1982, the new borough counted 905 inhabitants in 1983. The settlement was named for the three (tres) peaks (cantos) located at the western border of the municipal territory.
The municipality of Tres Cantos was established on 21 March 1991, separating from Colmenar Viejo and becoming the 179th and youngest municipality in the Community of Madrid.
[El Pais, 12 December 1983; Madrilánea, 13 January 2012]

Ivan Sache, 30 July 2015


Symbols of Tres Cantos

The flag (photo, photo, photos, photo, photo) and arms of Tres Cantos are prescribed by a Decree adopted on 2 July 1993 by the Government of the Community of Madrid and published on 16 September 1993 in the official gazette of the Community of Madrid, No. 220, p. 5 (text).
The symbols are described as follows:

Flag: In proportions 2:3. Panel tierced horizontally, the central stripe twice wider. Colours: Purple, white and red.
Coat of arms: Argent three [tres] rocks or peaks [cantos] ensigned by two holly oaks all proper. A bordure gules charged with seven stars argent. The shield surmounted with a Royal Spanish crown.

The flag in actual use is charged in the center with the municipal coat of arms.

The flag was inaugurated on 21 March 1994. The flag was jointly hoisted by Jacoba González, the oldest woman living in the municipality (100 years old) and Lorena García, the first girl born in the newly established municipality.
[El Pais, 22 March 1994]

The Royal Academy of History reviewed the proposals submitted by the municipality, which did not make any choice among those. The first proposal is not compliant with the traditional iconography of heraldry, both in its elements and colours ("a panoramic view of the tower", "a lawn under a sky azure", a shield with an inner cartouche...).
The second proposal uses the arms of the Luna family, ill-represented and extracted from the arms of Colmenar Viejo, although the Luna were never lords of that town.
The Division of the Historical Heritage of the Community of Madrid submitted a proposal inspired form a quarter of the first proposal, deemed "perfectly acceptable" by the Academy.
The Academy validated the proposed flag "without any inconvenience".
[Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia, 1993, 190:2, 335]

Ivan Sache, 30 July 2015