Day-Lewis puts his left foot forward for palace ceremony

The 57-year-old, the only person to win an Academy Award for best actor three times, was honoured at Buckingham Palace for services to drama.

Clean-shaven, with short, grey hair and dressed in traditional morning dress, the notably private Anglo-Irish actor declined to speak to the media after being honoured by William.

Sir Daniel was made a knight in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list in June, saying at the time he was “entirely amazed and utterly delighted in equal measure”.

He won his first Oscar for his role as a disabled writer in 1989’s My Left Foot, and a second for his turn as an early 20th century oilman in 2007’s There Will Be Blood. He completed his hat-trick by playing US president Abraham Lincoln in 2012.

Other high-profile roles include Guildford Four member Gerry Conlon in the film In The Name Of The Father, an adopted native American in The Last Of The Mohicans and a brutal butcher in Martin Scorsese’s Gangs Of New York.

Former sports and Olympics minister Hugh Robertson was also knighted. The Conservative MP for Faversham and Mid-Kent, 52, now a Foreign Office minister, was the minister responsible for the London games from 2010 to 2012. He said: “It was actually lovely to receive it from the Duke of Cambridge - he, his wife, his brother and his aunt were so closely involved in making [the Olympics] work that it made it very special, actually.”