The social and political system which operated in Lusignan Cyprus derived both from the island's Byzantine past and also from the concepts and institutions introduced by the new rulers after 1192. The monarchy remained essentially western in its outlook and attributes. What is known of the coronation ritual shows that the dynasty subscribed to ideas of kingship which belonged firmly within the European tradition. At its inception, and theoretically until 1247, the kingdom existed as a dependency of the western empire, and Aimery, the first of the kings, was invested with a sceptre and diadem supplied by his suzerain, the Hohenstaufen Henry VI. It is unfortunate that no crown jewels or insignia survive, but the royal seals and, from the early fourteenth century, the depiction of the monarch on the silver gros underline the distinctively European ethos of authority. It is true that until the late thirteenth century the kings were represented on their bezants in Greek fashion wearing the chlamys or loros, although this is probably more a sign of their conservatism in maintaining an imitative coinage based on a Byzantine type familiar at the time of the conquest than a symbol of their concept of royalty. In any case the garments shown on these coins are not so very different from those seemingly being worn by some twelfth-century kings of Jerusalem on their seals. The kings used the title ‘rex’, even when writing in Greek to the emperor at Nicaea, and made no attempt to adopt Byzantine formularies in their diplomatic correspondence.