Order of the Bath

The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by King George I on 18 May 1725. Recipients of the Order are usually senior military officers or senior civil servants, and the monarch awards it on the advice of His Majesty's Government. The name derives from an elaborate medievalceremony for preparing a candidate to receive his knighthood, of which ritual bathing (as a symbol of purification) was an element. While not all knights went through such an elaborate ceremony, knights so created were known as "knights of the Bath".

George I constituted the Knights of the Bath as a regular military order. He did not revive the order, which did not previously exist, in the sense of a body of knights governed by a set of statutes and whose numbers were replenished when vacancies occurred.

The Order consists of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom (currently King Charles III), the (currently William, Prince of Wales), and three Classes of members:

• Knight Grand Cross () or Dame Grand Cross ();
• Knight Commander () or Dame Commander (); and
• Companion ().

Members belong to either the Civil Division or the Military Division. Knight Companion (KB), the order's only class prior to 1815, is no longer an option. Commonwealth citizens who are not subjects of the British monarch and foreign nationals may be made honorary members.

The Order of the Bath is the fourth most senior of the British orders of chivalry, after the Order of the Garter, the Order of the Thistle, and the (dormant) Order of St Patrick.