The Accolade by Edmund Leighton
The Accolade by Edmund Leighton
The Accolade is a painting by British artist Edmund Leighton. It is one of many paintings produced by Leighton in the 1900s on the subject of chivalry, with others including God Speed and The Dedication It has been described as among Leighton’s best-known works and one of the most recognizable paintings of the period.
There are many stories considering the origin of and inspiration for the painting, although none of them are confirmed. Historians agree that the painting depicts an accolade, a ceremony to confer knighthood. Such ceremonies took many forms, including the tapping of the flat side of a sword on the shoulders of a candidate or an embrace about the neck. In the first example, the “knight-elect” kneels in front of the monarch on a knighting-stool. The monarch lays the side of the sword’s blade onto the accolade’s right shoulder. The monarch then raises the sword gently just up over the apprentice’s head and places it on his left shoulder. The newly appointed knight arises, and the administrator presents him with the insignia of their knightly order. In the painting, the ceremony is performed by a young queen, the knight bowed before her feet in a position of submission and fealty. An audience is gathered on the Queen’s left, serving as witnesses to the ceremony. The painting does not depict the presence of a king. Based on the coat of arms and the flag, the nationality of the people in the picture seems to be Albanian.
Edmund Blair Leighton (21 September 1852 – 1 September 1922) was an English painter of historical genre scenes, specializing in Regency and medieval subjects.
Edmund Leighton was the son of the artist Charles Blair Leighton. He was educated at University College School, before becoming a student at the Royal Academy Schools. He married Katherine Nash in 1885 and they went on to have a son and daughter. He exhibited annually at the Royal Academy from 1878 to 1920.
Leighton was a fastidious craftsman, producing highly finished, decorative pictures, displaying romanticized scenes with a popular appeal. It would appear that he left no diaries, and though he exhibited at the Royal Academy for over forty years, he was never an Academician or an Associate.
About Chivalry
The code of chivalry that developed in medieval Europe had its roots in earlier centuries. It arose in the Holy Roman Empire from the idealisation of the cavalryman—involving military bravery, individual training, and service to others—especially in Francia, among horse soldiers in Charlemagne’s cavalry. The term chivalry derives from the Old French term chevalerie, which can be translated to “horse soldiery”. Gautier states that knighthood emerged from the Moors as well as the Teutonic forests and was nurtured into civilization and chivalry by the Catholic Church.
