"French old guard cav flags, square?" Topic

I have been looking on the internet at examples and some paintings and to me it looks like the French old guard cav used square flags just like the infantry and not the more slender flags that end with angled "points", triangles that most countries seemed to use. Is this correct, can I use a square French flag for the cav???

yes, square and fairly small in cavalry standard fashion, the swallow tailed standards were in use for other cavalry regiments, like hussars – chasseurs à cheval and dragoons, till replaced by the square on in about 1812.

The Guard Dragoons got an eagle as late as 1811 – along with the chevau legers (lanciers) – their first standard was rejected because it bore the name of the empress.

The Guard Chasseurs a Cheval had the swallow-tailed flag. The Empress' Dragoons were supposed to have one but didn't get it till 1811 as referenced by Von Winterfeldt.

Both the Guard C a C and the Mameluks had the swallow tailed "guidon" on their eagles as flags up untill about 1812. The regiment might have switched to the new small square pattern as late as 1813. the subject of the standard and eagles is extensively discussed in Cdt Bucquoy's book "La garde impériale troupes a cheval" (it has a whole chapter on it) I tis unclear whether the shasseurs a cheval actually took an eagle (they had four untill then) into Russia. I have both the swallow tailed guidon and the square flag on a command stand so that I can interchange them when the regt.serves before or after russia 1812, personnaly I do like the general look of the guidon better than the square one. So I've already used that command stand at waterloo games and gotten away with it.

Thanks guys, well I mainly do 1812-1813 stuff, sounds like the square flag it is. The unit I am doing is the (and I am probably being a little general here) old guard heavy cav grenadiers with the bear skin hats and what looks like orange trim on the horse blankets. I play lots of different games and periods so I am not so wrapped up in making sure a unit had the right style boot in a particular month of a certain year so sounds like I will be okay with the square flag.
Thanks for the help guys, happy gaming.