Greece Flag

There is a blue canton in the upper hoist-side corner bearing a white cross; the cross symbolizes Greek Orthodoxy, the established religion of the people of Greece. According to popular tradition, the nine stripes represent the nine syllables of the phrase "E-lef-the-ri-a i Tha-na-tos" ("Freedom or Death"). There is also a different theory, that the nine stripes symbolize the nine Muses, the goddesses of art and civilization (nine has traditionally been one of the numbers of reference for the Greeks.