[8] 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.

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.

[10] Such an isolated location was impractical causing Charles VIII to transfer this meeting place to the chapel of Saint-Michel-du-Palais,[1] 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.

[1] The names of members can be gleaned from reference to their receipt of the order, from secondary sources, or from periodic lists compiled showing companions from particular families or regions.

[1][15] The first fifteen knights, men of "good sense, valiance, wisdom and other great and laudable virtues" (bon sens, vaillance, prud'hommie et autres grandes et louables vertus) were appointed by Louis XI and tasked to select, jointly with the king himself, the next ones to complete the first group of thirty-six:[16]