 The immense authority of the sacred college of pontiffs was centered on the Pontifex Maximus, the other pontifices forming his "consilium" or advising body.His functions were partly sacrificial or ritualistic, but these were the least important.His real power lay in the administration of "ius divinum" or divine law; the information collected by the pontifices related to the Roman religious tradition was bound in a "corpus" which summarized dogma and other concepts.