Order of Saint Michel
The Order of Saint Michel (Ordre de Saint Michel) is a French dynastic order of chivalry, founded by King Louis XI of France on 1 August 1469. Louis XI founded the Order of Saint Michel in 1469. Initially, there were thirty-six knights, but their numbers increased to such a point that the order began to lose its prestige. Louis XIV reformed the order on 12 January 1665, reducing the number of knights to one hundred}} in competitive response to the Order of the Golden Fleece founded by Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy, Louis' chief competitor for the allegiance of the great houses of France, the dukes of Orléans, Berry, and Brittany.
Although officially abolished by the government authorities of the July Revolution in 1830 following the French Revolution, its activities carried on. It is still recognised by the International Commission on Orders of Chivalry.
History[edit]
The first knights were among the most powerful nobles in France, close relatives of the king and a few from other royal houses in Europe. Originally, the number of members (called companions) was limited to thirty-five. In 1565, during the Wars of Religion, when loyalties were strained and essential, Charles IX increased the membership to fifty, but there may have been as many as seven hundred knights under Henry III in 1574.
The Order of Saint Michel dedicated to the Archangel Michael conveyed to every member a gold badge of the image of the saint standing on a rock (Mont Saint-Michel) in combat with the serpent.The motto of the order was "immensi tremor oceani" (meaning "The tremor of the immense ocean"), derived from the idea of Saint Michel looking out over the Atlantic from Mont Saint-Michel. It was suspended from the elaborate Collar of the Order of Saint Michael made of scallop shells (the badge of pilgrims, especially those to Santiago de Compostela) linked with double knots. The statutes state that the badge could be hung on a simple chain, and later it was suspended from a black ribbon
When the Order of St Michael was founded, the famous illuminator Jean Fouquet was commissioned to paint the title miniature of the Statutes, showing the king presiding over the knights (Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, fr. 19819). The original plan was for the knights to meet yearly on 29 September at Mont Saint-Michel in Normandy. Such an isolated location was impractical causing Charles VIII to transfer this meeting place to the chapel of Saint-Michel-du-Palais, part of Paris' medieval royal residence the Palais de la Cité which the kings no longer used, to the control of the order in 1496. By letters patent dated 15 August 1555, the seat of the Order was transferred to the royal Château de Vincennes outside Paris. The Order was abolished by Louis XVI on 20 June 1790 but s revived by Louis XVIII on 16 November 1816 but the king took little interest in the order and no new knights were added after 1816. The Order was again abolished by the French authorities in 1830.