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Beretinec (Municipality, Varaždin County, Croatia)

Flag of Beretinec - Image by Željko Heimer, 13 February 2003

Presentation of Beretinec
Flag of Beretinec
Coat of arms of Beretinec

See also:

Presentation of Beretinec

The Municipality of Beretinec (2,288 inhabitants in 2001, 1,54 in the village of Beretinec) is located some 10 km south-west of Varaždin.

Željko Heimer, 13 February 2003

Flag of Beretinec

The symbols of Beretinec are prescribed by Decision Odluka o izmjeni Odluke o opisu i uporabi grba i zastave Općine Beretinec, adopted on 31 July 1997 by the Municipality Assembly and published on 10 December 1998 in the County official gazette Službeni vjesnik Varaždinske županije, No. 22.
The Decision supersedes the previous, unpublihsed Decision Odluka o opisu i uporabi grba i zastave Općine Beretinec, adopted on 6 September 1994. Whether that Decision already prescribed the very same symbols is unclear, but I doubt - the new Decision looks like the simplification of a previous design, made upon request of the central authorities.

The symbols are described in the Municipality Statutes Statut Općine Beretinec, adopted on 9 October 2001 and published in Službeni vjesnik Varaždinske županije, No. 20. This was repeated in Statut Općine Beretinec, adopted on 27 January 2006 and published on 28 January 2006 in Službeni vjesnik Varaždinske županije, No. 2, in Statutes Statut Općine Beretinec, adopted on 13 July 2009 and published on 14 July 2009 in Službeni vjesnik Varaždinske županije, No. 20, and in the current Statutes Statut Općine Beretinec, adopted on 15 March 2013 and published on 29 March 2013 in Službeni vjesnik Varaždinske županije, No. 17 (text).

The flag is prescribed as follows:

... in proportions (height to length) 1:2, green. In the middle of the flag is the coat of arms of the Municipality of Beretinec. The coat of arms is made according to the pattern and the heraldic description in heraldic colours.

Unlike the flag described (and displayed in the building of the Varaždin County in Varaždin), the flag hoisted on the Municipality Hall (photo) has the coat of arms offset to the hoist.

Željko Heimer, 1 November 2013

Coat of arms of Beretinec

Coat of arms of Beretinec - Image by Željko Heimer, 9 July 2004

The coat of arms is prescribed as follows:

Heraldic description of the coat of arms:
On a red background, in the centre of the field, a golden hedgehog turned to the right.

Literary description of the coat of arms:
The coat of arms of the Municipality of Beretinec depicts a golden hedgehog on a red background.
The hedgehog, as the symbol of the Municipality of Beretinec, is chosen due to its well-known characteristics, diligence, care for its home and its family, defence of its home even unto the price of its life. Nevertheless, it is a calm and secretive inhabitant of our woods. These characteristics may be shorty expressed with the folk saying "others [we do] not want, ours [we shall] not yeald"*. Besides, the hadgehog is, as we know, a woodlands animal and is unable to live witout the woods, so it may serve as an indirect symbol of healthy and unpolluted environment. With this views one may consider the hedgehog as a symbol of ecology.
Except this "naturally determined" depiction of the hedgehog in the coat of arms of the Municipality of Beretinec, there is also a historical justification. Namely, Dragutin Antolek Orešek, who owned the lands in Beretinec, is mentioned as the first journalist of Varaždin, as an Illyrian activist, and as a fighter against Germanization, which resulted in issuing the satirical journal Podravski jež [Podravina Hedgehog]. In the journal, Antolek criticized Germans and Germanization with a series of illustrations and sharp satirical texts, so that he was for that prosecuted. Besides the political activity he was also standing out in the cultural life of the region, so by his labor the singing society Vila was established in Varaždin in 1875.
Considering it all, we may say that the hedgehog on the coat of arms of the Municipality of Beretinec indicates the honest, hard-working and ecologically conscious people, being characteristics that are today quite respectable in Croatia and in the world.

*This "motto" (Tuđe nečemo, svoje ne damo) was known as a saying by Marshal Tito in 1944 on the island of Vis, regarding the Treaty of Rapallo that had granted in 1920 large parts of the eastern Adriatic coast and islands to Italy, claiming them back to Croatia and Slovenia. For what I am aware, there is no such folk saying recorded prior to this use. It seems, however, that the motto is used in the description without any reference to Tito and certainly not the Adriatic.

Željko Heimer, 29 September 2011