| red flag | something that irritates or demands immediate action, doing that is like waving a red flag in front of a bull |
| flag | a conspicuously marked or shaped tail |
American flag
Stars and Stripes
Star-Spangled Banner
Old Glory | the national flag of the United States of America |
| battle flag | a flag that leads troops into battle |
black flag
pirate flag
Jolly Roger
blackjack | a flag usually bearing a white skull and crossbones on a black background, indicates a pirate ship |
| flag | emblem usually consisting of a rectangular piece of cloth of distinctive design |
| flag flagstone | stratified stone that splits into pieces suitable as paving stones |
| pin flag | flagpole used to mark the position of the hole on a golf green |
| semaphore | an apparatus for visual signaling with lights or mechanically moving arms |
Stars and Bars
Confederate flag | the first flag of the Confederate States of America |
Union Jack
Union flag | national flag of the United Kingdom |
whistle stop
flag stop
way station | a small railway station between the principal stations or a station where the train stops only on a signal |
white flag
flag of truce | flag consisting of a piece of white cloth that is hoisted to signal surrender or to ask for a truce |
rudiment
first rudiment
first principle
alphabet
ABC
ABC's
ABCs | the elementary stages of any subject (usually plural), he mastered only the rudiments of geometry |
| message | a communication (usually brief) that is written or spoken or signaled, he sent a three-word message |
phone message
telephone message | a message transmitted by telephone |
| Armenian Armenian alphabet | a writing system having an alphabet of letters in which the Armenian language is written |
| masthead flag | a listing printed in all issues of a newspaper or magazine (usually on the editorial page) that gives the name of the publication and the names of the editorial staff, etc. |
| alphabet | a character set that includes letters and is used to write a language |
Roman alphabet
Latin alphabet | the alphabet evolved by the ancient Romans which serves for writing most of the languages of western Europe |
Hebrew alphabet
Hebraic alphabet
Hebrew script | a Semitic alphabet used since the th century BC for writing the Hebrew language (and later for writing Yiddish and Ladino) |
| Greek alphabet | the alphabet used by ancient Greeks |
Cyrillic alphabet
Cyrillic | an alphabet derived from the Greek alphabet and used for writing Slavic languages (Russian, Bulgarian, Serbian, Ukrainian, and some other Slavic languages) |
| Arabic alphabet | the alphabet of characters derived from Aramaic and used for writing Arabic languages (and borrowed for writing Urdu) |
phonetic alphabet
sound alphabet | an alphabet of characters intended to represent specific sounds of speech |
manual alphabet
finger alphabet | an alphabet used by the deaf, letters are represented by finger positions |
message
content
subject matter
substance | what a communication that is about something is about |
letter letter of the alphabet
alphabetic character | the conventional characters of the alphabet used to represent speech, his grandmother taught him his letters |
flag
signal flag | a rectangular piece of fabric used as a signalling device |
code flag
nautical signal flag | one of an international code of flag signals used between ships |
national flag
ensign | an emblem flown as a symbol of nationality |
| red flag | the emblem of socialist revolution |
flag waving
jingoism | an appeal intended to arouse patriotic emotions |
commercial
commercial message | a commercially sponsored ad on radio or television |
| red flag | a flag that serves as a warning signal, we didn't swim at the beach because the red flag was up |
| alphabet soup | soup that contains small noodles in the shape of letters of the alphabet |
| alphabet soup | a confusing assortment, Roosevelt created an alphabet soup of federal agencies |
chauvinist
jingoist
jingo
flag-waver
hundred-percenter
patrioteer | an extreme bellicose nationalist |
| flag captain | the captain of a flagship |
| flag officer | a senior naval officer above the rank of captain |
knight banneret
knight of the square flag
banneret | a knight honored for valor, entitled to display a square banner and to hold higher command |
sweet flag
calamus sweet calamus
myrtle flag
flagroot
Acorus calamus | perennial marsh plant having swordlike leaves and aromatic roots |
lesser bullrush
narrow-leaf cattail
narrow-leaved reedmace
soft flag
Typha angustifolia | reed maces of America, Europe, North Africa, Asia |
iris
flag
fleur-de-lis
sword lily | plants with sword-shaped leaves and erect stalks bearing brightolored flowers composed of three petals and three drooping sepals |
yellow iris
yellow flag
yellow water flag
Iris pseudacorus | common yellow-flowered iris of Europe and North Africa, naturalized in United States and often cultivated |
blue flag
Iris versicolor | a common iris of the eastern United States having blue or blue-violet flowers, root formerly used medicinally |
southern blue flag
Iris virginica | similar to blue flag, the eastern United States |
telegraph plant
semaphore plant
Codariocalyx motorius
Desmodium motorium
Desmodium gyrans | erect tropical Asian shrub whose small lateral leaflets rotate on their axes and jerk up and down under the influence of sunshine |
| flag smut fungus | a smut fungus causing a smut in cereals and other grasses that chiefly affects leaves and stems and is characterized chains of sori within the plant tissue that later rupture releasing black masses of spores |
wheat flag smut
Urocystis tritici | fungus affecting leaves and stems of wheat |