The emission spectra of several compounds of europium(III) incorporating a variety of β-diketonates and N-bases have been examined in order to obtain reliable information relating to coordination number, nature of bonding and symmetry around the lanthanide ion. It has been found that steric factors may force the polyhedron of coordination towards geometries less favorable by ligand-ligand repulsion. In general no correlation has been found to exist between the intensity of the hypersensitive transitions and high or low symmetry.