Recognition, n.
Etymology: [L. recognitio: cf. F. recognition. See Recognizance.]
The act of recognizing, or the state of being recognized; acknowledgment; formal avowal; knowledge confessed or avowed; notice. The lives of such saints had, at the time of their yearly memorials, solemn recognition in the church of God. Hooker.
Shades of meaning
Fernald has no entry of its own for recognition; he lists it under knowledge.
Where he writes about it:
Simple perception gives a limited knowledge of external objects, merely as such; the cognition of the same objects is a knowledge of them in some relation; cognizance is the formal or official recognition of something as an object of knowledge; we take cognizance of it. — from knowledge