Were the Nazis the first to implement a Jewish badge?
The Nazis rarely had an original idea. Almost always what made the Nazi policies different was that
they intensified, magnified, and institutionalized the age-old methods of persecution.
The oldest reference to using mandatory articles of clothing to identify and distinguish Jews from the rest of society was in
807 CE. In this year, Abbassid caliph Haroun al-Raschid ordered all Jews to wear a yellow belt and a tall, cone-like hat.1
But it was in 1215 that
the Fourth Lateran Council, presided over by Pope Innocent III, made its infamous decree. Canon 68 declared:
Jews and Saracens [Muslims] of both sexes in every Christian province and at all times shall be marked off in the eyes of the public from other peoples through the character of their dress.2
This Council represented all of Christendom and thus this decree was to be enforced throughout all of the Christian countries.
The use of a badge was not instantaneous throughout Europe nor were the dimensions or shape of the badge uniform. As early as 1217, King Henry III of England ordered Jews to wear "on the front of their upper garment the two tables of the Ten Commandments made of white linen or parchment."3 In France, local variations of the badge continued until Louis IX decreed in 1269 that "both men and women were to wear badges on the outer garment, both front and back,
round pieces of yellow felt or linen, a palm long and four fingers wide."4
In Germany and Austria, Jews were distinguishable in the latter half of the 1200's when t
he wearing of a "horned hat" otherwise known as a "Jewish hat" -- an article of clothing that Jews had worn freely before the crusades -- became mandatory. It wasn't until the fifteenth century when a badge became the distinguishing article in Germany and Austria.
The use of badges became relatively widespread throughout Europe within a couple of centuries and continued to be used as distinctive markings until the age of Enlightenment. In 1781, Joseph II of Austria made major torrents into the use of a badge with his Edict of Tolerance and many other countries discontinued their use of badges very late in the eighteenth century.