Persecution of Jews in Germany

Roman emperors
Under Christian emperors, Jews were persecuted in the Roman Empire, which included forbidding Jews from marrying Christians, restricting Jewish ownership of slaves, and punishing those that converted from Christianity to Judaism.

Frankish kings
King of the Franks Chlothar II forbade Jews to serve in any military or administrative office in 614. His successor, Dagobert I, demanded that Jews convert to Christianity or leave his dominions in 629. Those who did not convert or leave his dominions were killed.

Leo VII
In the mid-tenth century, Pope Leo VII described Jews as “enemies of God” and urged the archbishop of Mainz to expel Jews that refuse to convert to Christianity.

Massacre and exile in the 1010s
In the early 1010s, Jews were massacred in Mainz and other places near the Rhine river. In 1012, King Henry II of Germany (who later became the Holy Roman Emperor in 1014) ordered Jews who did not convert to Christianity to be exiled from Mainz.

Crusaders
The Crusaders were composed of Christians, and they massacred and forced Jews to convert to Christianity in multiple towns and destroyed the houses and synagogues of the Jews in the late 11th century during the First Crusade, the mid-12th century during the Second Crusade, and in the late 12th century during the Third Crusade. Crusaders persecuted, forcefully converted, forcefully baptized, and killed Jews in Speyer, Worms, Cologne, Regensburg, Trier, Neuss, Eller, Xanten, Kerpen, Geldern, Ellen, and hundreds of Jews died in Mainz during the Rhineland massacres of 1096. The Jewish communities of the Rhineland were attacked again in 1421 by Crusaders on their way to attack the Hussites.

Blood libels
Jews were murdered after blood libels, which are false accusations of having killed Christians (usually children) for rituals, in Würtburg in 1147, Boppard in 1179, Erfurt in 1199, Fulda and Wolfsheim in the mid-1230s, Frankfurt in 1241, Kitzingen in 1243, Pforzheim in 1267, Weissenberg in 1270, Bacharach, Mainz twice, Munich, and Oberwesel in the 1280s, Weissensee in 1303, Überlingen in the early 1330s and 1430, Nuremberg in 1467, and Endingen in 1470. There were other blood libels in Boppard in 1286, Thuringia in 1308, Munich in 1345, Regensburg in 1428, 1473, and 1476, Ravensburg and Lindau in 1430, Geisingen in 1518, Brandenburg in 1570, Fürth in 1745, Neuenhoven in 1834, Aachen and Jülich in 1840, Xanten in the early 1890s, and Eisleben in 1892.

12th-18th-century expulsions
In the late 12th century, Jews were expelled from Bingen, and in the 13th century, from Andernach and Frankfurt. In the mid-14th century, many locations in Germany expelled Jews after they were falsely blamed for the Black Death, and in the 15th century, the sermons of Franciscan John of Capistrano, who was appointed as Inquisitor, incited Christians to expel Jews from Neustadt and Franconia. Other expulsions of Jews occurred in Görlitz in 1389, Amberg, Arnstadt twice, Augsburg, Bamberg, Cochem, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Halberstadt, Halle, Heilbronn three times, Koblenz, Mainz four times, Magdeburg, Nuremberg, Passau, Ravensburg, Speyer, Trier, and Ulm in the 15th century, Bayreuth, Bingen, Cochem, Dortmund, Einbeck, Göttingen, Halberstadt, Mühlhausen, Münster, Nordhausen, Nördlingen, Regensburg, Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Schweinfurt, Villingen, Weissenburg, and Würzburg in the 16th century, Aachen, Frankfurt, Giessen, and Lauingen in the 17th century, and Wuppertal and Munich in the 18th century. Jewish people were also expelled from entire states or regions, as happened in Upper Bavaria in 1276 and 1442, the Palatinate in the 1390s and 1550s, Thuringia in 1401, Saxony in 1432 and 1540, Brandenburg in 1446, 1510, and 1573, Bavaria in 1450 and 1551, Baden in 1470 and 1614, Pomerania in the early 1490s, Württemberg in 1521, Hesse in 1524, and Brunswick, Hanover, and Lünesburg in 1553.

Clothing laws for Jews
The Diocesan Council at Mainz in 1229 ordered Jews to wear horned hats, and a synod of the archdiocese in Mainz in 1259 ordered Jews to wear yellow badges. Jews were also required to wear a badge in Augsburg in 1434, Nördlingen in 1437, and Bamberg and Hanover in 1451.

Host desecration accusations
Jews were murdered after accusations of host desecration in Beelitz in 1243, Röttingen in 1298 (part of the Rintfleisch massacres), Deggendorf in the late 1330s, Passau in 1478, Mecklenburg in 1492, Brandenburg, and Berlin in 1510. Jews were also expelled from Passau and Brandenburg. Beginning in 1298, thousands of Jews were killed in Germany by a Christian mob led by Rintfleisch. There was another host desecration accusation in Munich in 1413.

Louis IV
Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV instituted more taxes for Jews in 1342. He decreed that every Jewish male aged 12 and above pay an annual tax of one kreutzer in every gulden of their property, in addition to the taxes they were already paying.

Persecution of Jews during the Black Death
Jews were falsely blamed for the Black Death or bubonic plague pandemic in Europe during the mid-14th century. They were persecuted and massacred. Jews were often used by Christians to blame due to their resentment of them, considering the antisemitic Christian belief that Jews as a people hold the responsibility for killing Jesus Christ, known as Jewish deicide. Many Jews were murdered in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Poland, Spain, Switzerland, and the Netherlands.

Ghetto
In the 1460s, a ghetto was established in Frankfurt am Main for the purpose of segregating Jews.

Maximilian I
The Catholic theologian Johannes Pfefferkorn was authorized by Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I to confiscate Jewish books.

Martin Luther
The Protestant Reformer Martin Luther advocated for persecuting Jews in On the Jews and Their Lies in 1543 and Martin Luther's Table Talk. He called for destroying Jewish property, forbidding rabbis from teaching under the pain of death, taking belongings from Jews, and killing Jews.

Frederick II
King Frederick II of Prussia restricted Jews in trade, occupation, residence, and marriage. Jews were also taxed more under Frederick's reign.

Hep-Hep riots
Antisemitic pogroms in 1819 that began in Würzburg, called the Hep-Hep riots, occurred in Germany, Alsace in France, and Denmark. Jews were abused, and Jewish property was pillaged and destroyed. The riots lasted from August to October.

Adolf Stoecker
In the late 19th century, Adolf Stoecker, court chaplain to German Emperor Wilhelm I, gave antisemitic speeches and petitioned to take civil rights away from Jews.