The Hispano-Gothic church was absolutely independent of Rome. The supremacy of the pope was not recognized, and, in all the annals antedating the Reconquest, there is no mention of an appeal to the Holy See on questions of government, ceremonial, or doctrine. The bold and haughty spirit of the Basques and Iberians, animated the ecclesiastics of both the Arian and Catholic churches of Spain. Before the Saracen conquest there were no archbishops. The metropolitans, or bishops of the principal churches, were equal in rank in the hierarchy, until the national councils began to be regularly held in the sixth century; when, gradually, by common consent, Toledo became the seat of the Primacy, a distinction which it has ever since maintained. The dominance of the priesthood in the government, once established, advanced with prodigious strides. In the eighth Council of Toledo, seventeen nobles and fifty-two bishops sat; in the sixteenth Council, held fourteen years afterwards, there were in attendance sixteen palatines and counts, and seventy-seven prelates, and, with this preponderating ratio of ecclesiastics, the authority and importance of the latter naturally increased. The morals of the clergy in that age, while far from being blameless, were not subject to the reproach which they so justly incurred from the profane and ribald poets and novelists of subsequent times. Their influence over the people was unbounded, and their popularity, for the most part, well deserved. Their intervention in behalf of the oppressed effectually curbed the ferocious instincts of the monarch and the noble. The criminal, pursued to the doors of the church, or to the foot of the altar, could not be removed from their sacred precincts without the consent of a priest, or a bishop; and the mere fact that he sought refuge in the House of God rendered him exempt from the death penalty, no matter how grave the character of his offence might be. To the bishop was granted the right of supervision over the conduct of the judge, when the latter exceeded his powers, or rendered decisions manifestly in violation of justice. The Goths, the most plastic and obedient of proselytes, regarded their spiritual advisers with peculiar respect and veneration. They were their guides, their protectors, their benefactors. Nor was the potent influence of the clergy in the maintenance of justice and right, confined to the lower orders. They pronounced anathemas against treason; excommunicated pretenders to the throne; curbed the ambition and greed of marauding nobles; compelled the reverence of aspirants to the royal office; and exacted from the king, who was often their creature, the deference and submission which they considered due to their sacred office and authority.