This chapter outlines the thesis and structure of the book. The British coronation is an ancient survival of a political, social and religious ritual which inaugurates and establishes the King (or Queen regnant) in the possession of the throne. It can be aced in its present form bac at least to the time of King Edgar in the tenth century, but equally importantly must be understood in a wider historical context. This includes the coronations of the Holy Roman Empire, and the Germanic sates of western Europe, as well as more ancient Israeli, and even Egyptian precedents. This chapter explains both the underlying thesis—that the coronation has political, legal and theological functions which render it central to the constitution—and how this thesis will be addressed.