Note 203 — Chapter II · THE JEWS AND THE MOORS.

Concil. Lateran. IV, ann. 1216, cap. lxviii (cap. 15, Extra, v, vi). This device originated among the Saracens of the East, who, in the eleventh century, required Jews and Christians to wear distinctive badges (Fernández y González, p. 16). The earliest trace of it in the West is found in the charter of Alais, in 1200, which prescribes distinctive vestments for Jews (Robert, Les Signes d’Infamie au Moyen Age, p. 7). In Italy, Frederic II obeyed the Lateran decree by ordering, in 1221, all Jews to wear distinguishing garments (Richardi de S. German. Chron. ap. Muratori, S. R. I., VII, 993), but he did not insert this in the Sicilian Constitutions or include his Saracen subjects. In 1254 the council of Albi prescribed for Jews a circle, a finger-breadth in width, to be worn upon the breast, and that of Ravenna, in 1311, a yellow circle (Harduin. VII, 458, 1370). In the fifteenth century, the Neapolitan Jews were required to wear as a sign the Hebrew letter Tau (Wadding, Annal. Minor. T. III, Regest. p. 392).