The introduction and permanent establishment of the Roman liturgy in Frankish realms form the background of public worship in the Carolingian era. When Pippin ascended the throne in 752, the Gallican Rite prevailed. When the reign of Charles the Bald came to a close in 877, the Roman Rite was supreme.[1] Charlemagne received the Gregorian Sacramentary from Pope Hadrian I.[2] Stimulated by his desire to unify the Germanic peoples under papal as well as imperial authority, he brought about by royal edicts or capitularies a widespread reform in the western continental church. Those features of his program which affected hymnology include requirements that priests must be educated, that monks observe their monastic rule, that the singing of the psalms and the _gloria_ be improved, that schools of singing and grammar be founded in monastic and diocesan centers, that both regular and secular clergy be urged to acquire knowledge and skill in singing, that the Roman Chant be ordained, that a singing school be established at Aix-la-Chapelle, that the clergy read and sing well.[3] Charlemagne’s successors, Louis the Pious and Charles the Bald continued his reforming policy. In the legislation cited above, Charlemagne had followed his father’s example which favored a training in Gregorian music under Roman teachers, as developed in the schools of Rome.[4] Pippin’s interest had resulted in the establishment of a musical center of great repute at Metz[5] which also possessed a cathedral school representative of the finest institutions which flourished at this time side by side with monastic centers of learning. Charlemagne was presented with a copy of the Benedictine Rule with choir rules, office and festival hymns, by Theodomar, Abbot of Monte Cassino, sometime between 787 and 797.[6] It became his chosen duty to promulgate the Rule, to require its observance everywhere within his realms and further to extend the influence of the Order in general. Consequently, monastic centers of music arose, for example, at St. Gall where the hymnody of the offices was fostered and gradually made available for the bishoprics as well. Louis the Pious, (814-840), and Charles the Bald, (843-877), in their turn continued the patronage of the Benedictine Order. Already fortified by the efforts of Charlemagne, the Benedictines entered a period of religious and cultural influence which was later merged into the age of the universities. Linked directly with the program for monastic reform, the impulse to write new hymns and the encouragement to finer musical performance together created the annual cycles of this period in which the older hymns were retained and supplemented by the new.