Similarly as in the case of the Thirteenth ([1027]) and Fourteenth Councils of Toledo ([1026]) in AD 683 and 684, I suppose that abbots in the section of the list following the signatures of the bishops are superiors of monasteries (for comparison see signatures of the Eleventh Council of Toledo in AD 675 in which present abbots are identified by their monastery), while abbates in the section of the signatures of the deputies of the absent bishops are members of the diocesan clergy (see Canon 11 of the council of Merida in AD 666 [817], which puts them between presbyters and deacons). We do not know whether they had presbyterial ordination, but Canon 3 of the Eleventh Council of Toledo in AD 675 [857] mentions abbates celebrating Divine Office and Mass. It is possible that abba was a title of a cleric in charge of a basilica (cf. the study of the "abbots of the basilicas" in sixth-century Gaul by Pietri 1983). Bishko (1941) acknowledges the difference between abbots present at the council at their own and those who were representatives of the bishops. He assumes, however, that both these groups belonged to the monastic milieu; he proposes that bishops from distant dioceses were asking the abbots of the monasteries from Toledo and its close proximity to represent them at the council. There is no decisive argument backing this claim. It is, however, accepted by Orlandis (1986).