The Symbolic Meaning of the Flags of Kings and Heroes in Shahnameh

The flags of the Kings and Heroes in Shahnameh and other epic texts are of important symbolic and ritual significance. The Symbolic signs and their characteristics on flags are important in the analysis of their owners’ personal, public and psychological characteristics. This archetypal approach to signs reflects Ferdowsi’s intention in expressing the function of some epic instruments, such as weapons, flags, horses and tents. In Shahnameh the matching of these signs and their implied cultural significance reflect their semiotic an archetypical power. So each of these signs and images like sun, moon, stars and animals—dragon, lion, wolf, tiger, and eagle—and colors such as black and purple show the complex texture of anthropological feature. This research is both descriptive and analytical and the researchers have consulted different dictionaries of symbols and highlighted the function of each image in its epic space considering the change of its meaning in time.