Fourth Lateran Council

The Fourth Lateran Council, called by Pope Innocent III, met in the Lateran Palace in Rome in November 1215 with more than 400 bishops and hundreds of abbots and envoys of Christian rulers. Of its 71 canons, four concerned the Jews. Canon 67 attacked "heavy and immoderate" Jewish interest. Canon 68 ordered that Jews and Muslims of both sexes in every Christian land be distinguished from Christians by their dress at all times, and forbade them to appear in public in the last three days before Easter. Canon 69 barred Jews from public office, and canon 70 forbade baptized Jews to keep their old rites. The council also defined the doctrine of transubstantiation, which later fed accusations that Jews desecrated the Host.

The rule on dress was enforced country by country: England required a badge in the shape of the two Tablets of the Law from 1218, France the yellow rouelle (a ring of cloth) under Louis IX in 1269, and the German lands the pointed Jewish hat. The marking of Jews as outsiders lasted for centuries and was revived in the yellow star of the Nazis.