All people crave recognition, and Scandinavians have a particularly liking for recog-nition in the form of a medal or a title. In the case of Orders of Knights you get both and that is perhaps why the Danes established their Order of the Elephant already in 1462. The other Nordic countries soon followed suit. Iceland came last with its Order of the Falcon in 1921.

The establishment of Orders of Knights goes back many centuries. Many spiritual orders were set up in the Holy Land during the Crusades to promote and defend Christianity and protect the pilgrims. Despite their religious nature, these orders eventually became more civilian and were often led by kings. Napoleon Bonaparte shocked the European royal houses when he founded the French Legion of Honour in 1802, to bestow knighthood on common citizens who had given exceptional services to the nation.

It has been stated that the four symbols of an independent nation are its flag, its coat of arms, its national anthem and its decorations. Today most countries have some kind of order of recognition. In Europe it is only Switzerland and Ireland that no longer hand out decorations.

In the Nordic countries it is the head of the state who bestows the order on deserving persons, such as visiting heads of state. In most of the countries decorations are also granted to deserving citizens that often receive them automatically with a promotion.

A medal is often beautiful as a piece of jewelry with real gold and precious stones. The medal itself is generally only a loan and should be returned after the bearer has deceased, but many medals (and the miniatures carried at informal occasions) often appear at auctions.

A person may also be deprived the right to wear an order if he or she has been found guilty of an offence. Sweden fought hard to get back its medals from Rumanian dictator Ceaceasceau during his lifetime.

In Finland the medal remains the property of the person who has received it as he or she has to pay for the actual material cost.

The decorations are often criticized for being undemocratic and therefore undeserving of a modern country. The orders have an aura of being secret and in some cases this is true with the members being bound by an oath of silence. There are secret ceremonies, passwords, and symbols and you can never question the reason for a particular selection.

Most orders divide their members in various ranks such as Knights of the Grand Cross, Commanders or just Knights, but seldom according to merit. The level of decoration you receive depends on your social standing. All the same recipients are uniformly happy to receive an order and very seldom are they declined. For a country it is a very inexpensive way to award happiness.

NORWAY

It was King Oscar I who started the Royal Order of St Olav in 1847 when he was ruler of both Sweden and Norway. It was the country’s only state order and right from the start open for both women and men from Norway or abroad who had contributed something important to the country or mankind. Nowadays the white enamel cross available as grand cross and in the commander and knight classes are only given to Norwegians. After the breakup of the Swedish Norwegian Union in 1905 there have only been five persons who have received the very highest grade of the order which is the Grand Cross with chain, an addition made by Oscar I in 1882. Foreign nationals are nowadays rewarded with the newer Royal Norwegian Order of Merit, that is also conferred on Norwegian nationals who are permanently resident abroad and to foreign civil servants for diplomatic services.