Whence did this Spanish rite come? There is no definite evidence which will permit us to say for certain. It may be that the idea of a religious ceremony of inauguration was borrowed from Constantinople. The barbarian peoples, as they became the new nations, imitated so far as possible the institutions of the Empire, and so it is possible that the Visigoths adopted their coronation rite in imitation of the imperial rite of Constantinople. But if this was so, it is no more than the idea of a religious rite of inauguration which they borrowed. We have seen that the central feature of the Eastern rite was the coronation, and there is no evidence of any unction before the latter part of the ninth century, while on the other hand the central feature of the Visigothic rite was the anointing, and there is no reference to any crowning in Visigothic times. It is true, again, that in the later Spanish rites of Aragon and Navarre there appear very special and peculiar features which we may be tempted to refer to a Byzantine origin, but as we have seen, these features will bear quite well another interpretation. Until we have definite evidence of any connection between the two, it is unsafe to derive the Spanish rite from the Eastern. The outstanding fact is that here in Spain we have, so far as the West is concerned, the beginnings of the coronation or consecration rite of kings, and that its central characteristic clearly consists of the anointing. In the middle of the eighth century we find France also using an inaugurating rite. In 750 Pippin-le-bref was consecrated by St Boniface as king of the Franks, and at the end of the eighth century we find on two occasions, both of which were exceptional, Saxon kings being consecrated. The question now arises, where did the French rite, and the rite used in England originate? We have no definite evidence and can only surmise. The fact that Boniface the anointer of Pippin was an Englishman, together with the fact that it has generally been taken for granted that the so-called Pontifical of Egbert is really Egbert’s, and therefore belongs to the middle of the eighth century, has led to the tempting theory that the French rite was imported from England by St Boniface on the occasion of Pippin’s consecration as king of the Franks. But there is no evidence in support of this theory, and above all there is no evidence of the existence of an Anglo-Saxon rite of this period for St Boniface to import into France.