2-798-536 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Installation of a Knight of the Bath, 1844. The Order of the Bath is conferred by Queen Victoria. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved bathing (as a symbol of purification) as one of its elements. '...the Ceremony of the Sovereign investing a Knight with the Order, in the Throne-room, at St. James's Palace...The Collar is of gold, weighing thirty ounces Troy weight, and is composed of nine imperial crowns, and eight roses, thistles, and shamrocks, issuing from a sceptre, enamelled in their proper colours, tied or linked together with seventeen gold knots, enamelled white, having the badge of the Order pendant therefrom'. From "Illustrated London News", 1844, Vol V.