It brought the bishops into subjection to Rome, and made the pontiff the supreme judge of the clergy of the whole Christian world.

It prepared the way for the great attempt, subsequently made by Hildebrand, to convert the states of Europe into a theocratic priest-kingdom, with the pope at its head.
Gregory VII., the author of this great attempt, saw that his plans would be best carried out through the agency of synods.

He, therefore, restricted the right of holding them to the popes and their legates.

To aid in the matter, a new system of church law was devised by Anselm of Lucca, partly from the old Isidorian forgeries, and partly from new inventions.

To establish the supremacy of Rome, not only had a new civil and a new canon law to be produced, a new history had also to be invented.