Legion of Honour
highest French order of merit
The National Order of the Legion of Honour (French: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur [ɔʁdʁ nɑsjɔnal d(ə) la leʒjɔ̃ dɔnœʁ] ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (Ordre impérial de la Légion d'honneur), is the highest and most prestigious French national institution, both military and civil. It consists of five classes and was originally established in 1802 by Napoleon Bonaparte. The order has been retained, with occasional minor alterations, by all subsequent French governments and regimes.
The order's motto is Honneur et Patrie ("Honour and Fatherland"); its seat is the Palais de la Légion d'Honneur next to the Musée d'Orsay, on the left bank of the Seine in Paris. Since 1 February 2023, the Order's grand chancellor has been retired general François Lecointre.
The order is divided into five degrees of increasing distinction: Chevalier (Knight), Officier (Officer), Commandeur (Commander), Grand officier (Grand Officer) and Grand-croix (Grand Cross).
While prestigious, the Legion of Honour has sometimes been controversial. The order of merit has been awarded to Harvey Weinstein, Mohammed bin Nayef, Vladimir Putin, Bashar al-Assad, and Manuel Noriega. In 2010, the order's rules were changed to revoke Noriega's award after his extradition to France due to his conviction for money laundering. In 2017, further reforms to the award were made.
The public source identifies “Legion of Honour” as highest French order of merit. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Legion, Honour and highest.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q163700. VIAF identifies the subject as 269736477. The Library of Congress control number is n83197456. 4 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1802, 2023, 2010 and 2017.
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This entry incorporates text from “Legion of Honour” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.