Yeah, I *know* what it looks like, lol.
[hr style="width: 100%; height: 2px;"]There are pillars [a href="http://snipurl.com/ozip"]like these[/a] all over Amsterdam. Tour guides say they served as warnings to ships docking there-- the X's stand for fire, flood nd black death (pestilence). [a href="http://www.ignatzmice.com/Adam/FUT.htm"]This website[/a] claims it refers to St. Andew's cross (which is the flag of Scotland and one of the flags unionized in the Jack along with St. George's red cross and Ireland's red X). It was originally X X X not XXX and appears on the Amsterdam coat-of-arms vertically, but [a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Flag_of_Amsterdam.svg"]Amsterdam's flag[/a] has it the [a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Wapen_amsterdam.jpg"]naughty way[/a]. This [a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amsterdam"]Wikipedia entry[/a] translates the coat of arms' motto as "Valiant, Resolute, Merciful."
[img style="width: 525px; height: 504px;" src="http://myke.trecento.com/pics/locations/amsterdam/xxx_pillar.jpg?big_img=1"]
