We have, in the preceding pages, traced the development of the flag up to the closing years of the eleventh century without finding any evidence of the existence of a national flag, that is, of a flag flown, not to denote the presence of some particular leader at sea or on the field of battle, or that some especial religious sanction or blessing had been conferred or expected, but to indicate that the ship, town or other strong place upon which it was placed owned allegiance to some particular state or sovereign authority: a flag that might, on suitable occasion, be flown by any subjects of that state, not as their personal ensign but as a symbol of the collective body of which they were members. While the Roman Empire stood at the height of its power, with the whole civilised world under its dominion, there was no need of any such device; and long after it had in fact passed away the theory of its nominal existence survived and hindered the development of any national consciousness. It is clear that this feeling must have been strong since we find it shared by such a man as Theodoric the Ostrogoth, who, although _de facto_ ruler of Italy from 493 to his death in 526, professed his allegiance to the Eastern Empire and showed anxiety to get his position recognised by the Emperor at Constantinople. The history of the next five hundred years is that of a continuous succession of struggles for power and possession of territory between kings, nobles and ecclesiastics, and although the crowning of Charlemagne by the Pope in 800 was a formal repudiation by Rome of the authority of the Eastern Emperor there is no indication that the idea of nationality had yet arisen in the minds of men. The flag which Leo III presented to him was not in any way a national emblem; it was the symbol of his supreme authority and no more. In the ninth and tenth centuries there existed a certain number of religious flags of greater or less reputation for their wonder-working powers, of which the Oriflamme of Saint Denis may be taken as the type, but these were never national in the sense in which we have defined this word above.