The following documents are drawn from the Bullarium Romanum, Taurinensis Edition, Vol. VII, covering the pontificates of Pius IV and Pius V. This volume contains three significant documents bearing on the Church’s discipline regarding the Jews: a declaration by Pius IV moderating Paul IV’s severe ghetto constitution, a motu proprio by Pius V confiscating immovable goods held by Hebrews in defiance of prior orders, and the landmark bull of Pius V expelling Jews from virtually all papal territories. Translations are made from the Latin originals as preserved in the Vatican Archives and printed in the Bullarium.
Pope Pius IV — Declaration and Limitation of the Constitution Issued by Paul IV on the Ordinances to Be Observed by Hebrews in the Ecclesiastical State (1562 AD)
Pius Pope IV to all and each of the Hebrews of either sex dwelling and accustomed to dwell in our beloved City of Rome: to acknowledge the way of truth and to keep it once acknowledged.
Some time ago, letters were issued by Paul Pope IV of happy memory, our predecessor, moved by zeal for the Christian religion, concerning your and other Hebrews‘ way of life — dated, that is, on the day before the Ides of July in the first year of his pontificate — under the pretext of which letters, as we have learned, by the calumny and cavilling of certain persons greedy for your resources, who interpreted those letters in many respects beyond the intention of that same predecessor, you have been variously vexed and disturbed.
§ 1. Jews permitted a black hat when travelling; ghetto quarter to be enlarged if needed
Wherefore we, considering that holy mother Church grants many things to Hebrews, whom she tolerates in memory of the Lord’s Passion, so that, attracted by Christian benignity, they may at last acknowledge their error and be converted to Christ who is the true light — following also in the footsteps of many of our predecessors, and wishing to provide opportunely for your condition — by our own motion, not at your instance or that of any of you or of another on your behalf, but of our mere deliberation and out of our certain knowledge and the fullness of apostolic power, we grant and indulge you all and each that, when it happens that you travel from one place to another, you may wear in transit a black hat or cap; provided that if you remain in any one place beyond one day, you thereafter wear the customary sky-blue hat. And we will that if the quarter assigned for your habitation is sufficiently large and capable and suitable and convenient for conducting business and trade, you remain within it; otherwise, that another capable and convenient one be assigned to you, or the first be enlarged as much as may be needed.
§ 2. Jews permitted to hold immovable property up to 1,500 ducats
And beyond the houses existing in the enclosure which you may happen to acquire, you may hold whatever other immovable goods or urban and rural estates up to the value of one thousand five hundred gold ducats; and you may lease those goods to Christians and tenants, even sharecroppers or for a fixed annual pension, as you shall agree with them; and also, without any fraud and monopoly, you may enter into partnerships with those same Christians for the cultivation of lands and animals of any kind and other things, and carry on whatever trades and commerce in goods and things of whatever kind necessary for human use — including oil, grain, wine, barley and other produce — unless the authorities shall have forbidden such commerce and purchases by public edict to all persons, even Christian merchants; and where these things have been given to you by your debtors in payment, you may receive them, and having received them, sell them to any persons, even Christians, and exchange them for other goods with them, and alienate them as you will.
§ 3. Honest conversation with Christians permitted; interest on loans regulated
And you may have honest conversation and familiarity with Christians, provided that you do not have those same Christians as your domestic servants or hold them in any way. And on monies lent by you and each of you, you may charge interest, for the time elapsed up to the date of the letters of the said predecessor, according to the terms previously granted and tolerated to you — excepting however cases already decided, or concluded by transaction or sentence passed into res judicata, which we will to remain entirely in their force, unless such as seem to us worthy of fresh review; and from that date forward, according to the manner given to you by the ordinance of that same predecessor, and until another manner shall be established for you by us or our and the Apostolic See’s said camerarius for the time being, provided that in the meantime you do not exact interest upon your interest.
§ 4. Pledges; city statutes; house rents; restoration of goods improperly taken
And pledges which you may happen to receive from Christians in any manner, you may sell after the lapse of eighteen full months since they were consigned to you, by public auction, with a public official present and due notice given to the party; and retaining the price thereof for the concurrent amount of your credit — returning and consigning the remainder, if any shall be left over, to the owners of those pledges, or depositing it in the hands of an official — you shall not be bound to render any account of them to their owners or to anyone else, but may freely dispose of them as of your own goods. And we permit that the house-owners in the said places shall be bound to rent those houses to you for a just price, to be declared by the said camerarius, and shall not be able to increase or alter it in any way. And if certain persons bought from you immovable goods which you were compelled to sell by virtue of the apostolic letters of the said predecessor, and have not yet paid you for them, even under pretext of securities against eviction or other things calumniously demanded but not furnished, we command that the agreed prices be paid to you in full without the furnishing of any security, or that those very immovable goods bought by them be restored to you in the state they were at the time of purchase, together with the fruits collected by them.
§ 8. General pardon for past offences against Paul IV’s constitution
And moreover we absolve and free you all and each from all and whatever offences, crimes, and excesses — including transgressions against the letters of the said Paul our predecessor and against the letters of whatever cardinals of the Holy Roman Church or other persons, including failure to produce books or otherwise to comply with those letters — and other transgressions, howsoever grave and enormous, committed by you up to the present day; with the exception only of the crimes of homicide and those greater than homicide, of lèse-majesté, of counterfeiting money, of falsification of apostolic letters, and of those committed in contempt of the Christian faith.
§ 9–10. Future complaints limited to one year; only common-law prescription to apply
And moreover we will that, for future transgressions in the matter of exacting your interest, the complainant or accuser shall have only one year to prosecute his accusation or complaint as regards the penalty to be applied as aforesaid; but as regards the civil interest of the complainant or accuser or any other third party, no other time limit shall apply except that established by common law. And equally, that against your credits — past, present, and future — only that prescription shall be pleaded which is established by common law; and that throughout the entire time during which a person uses your money, interest shall be understood to run, reckoning however day for day, month for month, and not a day for a month; and that penalties for your transgressions shall henceforth be arbitrary, except however in those cases for which certain penalties are established by common law.
§ 11–12. Shops outside the ghetto permitted; books to be kept in Italian
Furthermore we permit you that you may keep shops outside the Jewish enclosure or quarter — as contiguous to it as possible — and remain in them from sunrise to sunset, excepting feast days, and exercise your commerce and trades and banking and other permitted activities; provided that, when night comes, you return to your customary dwellings within the enclosure. And, to prevent frauds, we command that you keep the accounts you shall have with Christians written in the characters of the vernacular Italian language; otherwise your books or accounts written or noted otherwise than as aforesaid shall be given no credence whatsoever; you may however at your pleasure write private books for your own use in your Hebrew language, provided that you do not thereby bring actions against Christians.
Given at Rome, at Saint Peter’s, in the year of the Lord’s Incarnation 1562, on the twelfth day before the Kalends of March, in the third year of our pontificate.
Dated February 18, 1562; pontificate year 3.
Source. Bullarium Romanum, Taurinensis Edition, Vol. VII, pp. 167–172. Pope Pius IV, declaration and limitation of Paul IV’s constitution on Hebrews in the Ecclesiastical State. Translated from the Latin.
Pope Pius V — Prohibition on Jews Holding Immovable Goods; Such Goods, If Not Sold, Applied to the House of Catechumens in Rome (1567 AD)
We, having recently renewed the constitution of Paul Pope IV of happy memory, our predecessor, issued against the Hebrews, and having among other things established and commanded that Hebrews, both in our beloved City and in whatever other cities, lands, and places subject to the temporal dominion of the Holy Roman Church, should be bound to sell to Christians, within a time to be fixed by the magistrates, the immovable goods possessed by them — notwithstanding the indult and concession made to those same Hebrews by Pius IV, also our predecessor of happy memory, that it was lawful for them to hold and possess immovable goods up to the value of one thousand five hundred gold ducats of the Camera — and having likewise forbidden many things to those same Hebrews so that it should not be lawful for them to do them, and having commanded in part that those same persons be bound to do and observe certain things; and having decreed that if those said Hebrews should be deficient in anything concerning those matters, they could be punished according to the nature of the offence, in the said City by us or our vicar or others to be deputed by us, and in the said cities, lands, and places by the magistrates, as rebels and guilty of the crime of lèse-majesté and declared enemies of all the Christian people, at the discretion of our vicar and those to be deputed and the magistrates —
As it has recently come to our notice that certain Hebrews, still with obstinate hardness of mind, have been striving and continue to strive daily to retain immovable goods against the tenor of the said constitution, or to transfer them to Christians in a simulated manner under various pretexts and masked contracts; and sometimes, in order the better to conceal their cunning, have been accustomed to concoct fictitious sales under apparent payment of the price, or with faith given for the price or a part of it, and to do other such things as well — in fraud and contempt of the said constitution and our commands and prohibitions, and to the scandal of very many —
We therefore, wishing, as is fitting, to oppose such frauds, and to provide that what we have established may have its effect in the aforesaid matters, by similar motion and out of our certain knowledge and the fullness of apostolic power, do renounce, on behalf of those same Hebrews, and of their ownership or quasi-ownership and all right and action whatsoever, all and whatever immovable goods which shall appear to belong to those Hebrews — both in this beloved City and in all other places subject to our and the Apostolic See’s jurisdiction, excepting the city of Bologna and other places where commissioners have already been deputed — after the day on which the said constitution was issued and after the expiration of the term fixed for them to sell, or insofar as need be yet to be fixed; whether those goods were possessed by them in person, or are known to pertain to them in any other way, or have been transferred from any title and cause to others, even Christians, of which goods the said Hebrews shall not have proved by undoubted payment of the price, and not merely apparent payment or faith given therefor from any cause, that true and valid sales were legitimately made. And we decree that they are and shall be deprived of those goods by the very fact of the law.
And those goods so renounced, as well as all and each of the penalties and fines which have been or may hereafter happen to be imposed and inflicted upon those same Hebrews on the occasion of transgression and disobedience against the several things contained in that same constitution of ours, whether also from the cause of contumacy or otherwise in connection with the premises, we apply and appropriate in perpetuity — one half to the hospital or house of catechumens of the City, and the other half to the Monte di Pietà of that same beloved City.
And for the easier execution of our commands and the present motu proprio, we avoke entirely to ourselves all and each of the cases, both in this same beloved City and in whatever cities, lands, and places subject to the temporal dominion of the Holy Roman Church, moved or to be moved in the future before whatever judges or even before our vicar in the said City, against those Hebrews on the occasion of the aforesaid matters, in the state and condition in which they are found; and we commit and delegate those cases, and all other similar cases, to our venerable brother John Michael, Bishop of Sabina, Cardinal Saraceno, protector and ordinary judge of the said house of catechumens, commanding him to proceed in all the premises, with their incidents, dependents, emergents, annexes, and connexes, up to their complete execution, summarily, simply, and plainly, with only the truth of the matter inspected.
Given at Rome, at Saint Peter’s, on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of February, in the second year of our pontificate.
Dated January 19, 1567; pontificate year 2.
Source. Bullarium Romanum, Taurinensis Edition, Vol. VII, pp. 514–516. Pope Pius V, motu proprio on prohibition against Jews holding immovable goods. Translated from the Latin.
Pope Pius V — Expulsion of the Jews from All Places of the Dominion of the Holy Roman Church, Except the City of Rome and the City of Ancona (1569 AD)
The Hebrew people, once alone chosen by God — which, infused with the divine oracles, was made a partaker of celestial mysteries — excelled all others in grace and dignity as much as afterwards, by the desert of its unbelief, it was merited to be cast down headlong, contemned and rejected; because, when the fullness of time came, it impiously and perfidiously reprobated its Redeemer, killing Him by an unworthy death. For, having lost the priesthood, with the authority of the law taken away, dispersed from its own lands which the most merciful and gracious God had prepared for it from the very beginning of that people’s origin — lands flowing with milk and honey — wandering now through so many ages across the world, hated, exposed to every insult and disgrace, it is compelled to ply the meanest and most infamous trades by which it can endure its hunger, no differently than the vilest slaves. But Christian piety, especially commiserating this inescapable downfall, suffered it to dwell among itself with sufficient humanity — so that, namely, through frequent sight of them, the memory of the Lord’s Passion might more often stand before the eyes of the faithful, and at the same time they might be the more invited by examples, teaching, and admonitions to the conversion and salvation which, by the oracle of the prophet, is to come to the remnant of Israel; from which salvation, if, expelled from Christian lands, they were to turn to those peoples who do not know Christ, they would be rendered more and more estranged from it.
Nevertheless their impiety, instructed in all the worst arts, has advanced to the point that it is now, for the common salvation of our people, expedient to check the force of so great a disease by a swift remedy. For — to pass over the many kinds of usury by which Hebrews have utterly drained the substance of poor Christians everywhere — we consider it sufficiently plain that they are receivers and accomplices of thieves and robbers, who strive to suppress, transfer to another place, or completely transform things stolen and misappropriated by those thieves, including not only profane things but even those dedicated to divine worship, lest they be identified; that many of them also, under the guise of practising a trade proper to themselves, frequenting the houses of honest women, plunge many of them into the most shameful debauchery; and, what is the most pernicious of all, devoted to sorceries, incantations, magical superstitions, and evil deeds, they lead very many incautious and weak persons into the tricks of Satan, leading them to believe that future events can be foretold, that fury, treasures, and hidden things can be revealed, and that many other things can be known, the power of investigating even which has been permitted to no mortal whatsoever. Finally, we have sufficiently well known and ascertained how unworthily this perverse race bears the name of Christ, how hostile it is to all who are known by that name, and by what plots it lies in wait for their lives. Moved by these and other most grave considerations, and impelled by the gravity of crimes daily increasing to the ruin of our cities, and considering further that the said people, apart from moderate trade with the East, is of no use to our commonwealth — while for our peoples, especially those somewhat more remote from us, it will be more advantageous to hear the name, the crimes, the miseries of that people reported to them from elsewhere, than to harbour it henceforth in their bosom as heretofore under any impulse of charity —
§ 1. By the authority of the present letters, we command that all and each of the Hebrews of either sex, in all our temporal dominions and of the cities, lands, and places therein, of the lords of manors, barons, and other temporal lords, even those having full and mixed jurisdiction and the power of life and death and whatever other jurisdiction and exemption, depart entirely from those territories within the space of three months from when the present letters shall have been published here.
§ 2. Once those months have passed, whosoever, whether inhabitants or strangers, present or future, shall be found in whatever city, land, or place of the said dominion — even of the lords of manors, barons, lords, and other exempted persons aforesaid — at whatever time, shall be despoiled of all their goods, which shall be applied to the fisc; they shall become slaves of the Roman Church and be claimed in perpetual servitude; and that Church shall claim over them the same right which other lords have over their slaves and bondsmen. Excepting only the City of Rome and Ancona, where we permit only those Hebrews who now inhabit them to be tolerated — for the further stirring of that memory, and for the pursuit of trade with the Eastern peoples and mutual commerce with them — provided however that they take care to observe our and our predecessors’ and other canonical constitutions concerning them; otherwise, by the very fact they shall fall into all the penalties contained in those constitutions, which we hereby renew. For we hope that those who are particularly near to our presence and that of this See will, from fear of punishment, refrain from evildoing, and that some of them, as has sufficiently happened heretofore even at our own exhortation, will joyfully acknowledge the light of truth. But neither those at Rome nor those at Ancona may at any time migrate or travel to other places in the said dominion, nor receive among them anyone of those proscribed, if they would avoid the yoke of servitude and punishment.
We therefore command the legates, governors, presidents, praetors, and magistrates of all the provinces, cities, and places of the said dominion, and likewise the local ordinaries, lords of manors, barons, lords, and exempt persons aforesaid, and all others to whom it pertains, that each one for his part, without awaiting any other command or declaration of our mind, execute all the aforesaid as soon as possible; and let them take care diligently that henceforth no Hebrews approach those provinces, cities, and places, even those of the lords of manors, barons, and the others aforesaid, from any cause whatsoever. Whoever, even of those who are now in Rome and Ancona, after the expiry of the next three months, is found in any part of the said dominion, even in places temporarily under the dominion of the same small lords, barons, lords, and exempted persons, shall immediately be thrown into perpetual servitude, enslaved to the aforesaid Church, and we signify that even more grievous penalties hang over their necks, so that others may learn by their example how serious it was to have rashly neglected this our prohibition.
§3. Notwithstanding the aforesaid and Apostolic constitutions and ordinances, common and municipal laws of the provinces, cities, and places mentioned above, nor [the obligations of] the Apostolic Chamber confirmed by oath, Apostolic confirmation, or any other firmness, statutes and customs, and conventions with the university of the aforesaid Hebrews, even under public faith, pacts, privileges, indults, exemptions, and Apostolic letters to all of them, and even to the aforesaid small lords, barons, and lords, and their cities, lands, places, and peoples, by any Roman Pontiffs our predecessors, and by us and the aforesaid See, even by our own motion and from certain knowledge, and by the fullness of Apostolic power, and otherwise in whatsoever manner, and under whatever tenors and forms, and for whatever
causes, even onerous, and with restitutions, preservations, derogations of derogations, and other stronger, most efficacious and unusual clauses, as well as irritants and other decrees, generally and specifically however many times granted, confirmed, and innovated many times. All and each of which, even if special, specific, express and individual mention of them and their entire tenors were to be made word for word, not by general clauses, or any other expression had to be made; treating such tenors as if they were inserted word for word in the present, insofar as they might impede or delay the aforesaid, or otherwise oppose them, by the series of these from similar fullness of power, we specifically and expressly revoke and abolish, and decree that they utterly lack force and effect, and that whatever might be attempted to the contrary by anyone knowingly or ignorantly, is null and void; and any other things to the contrary whatsoever.
§4. We wish moreover that copies of the present, even printed, be issued, and that these, signed by the hand of a public notary and sealed with the seal of any ecclesiastical court or prelate, shall make exactly the same proof in all places as the present itself would make if it were exhibited or shown.
§5. Therefore, let no one at all infringe this page of our permission, precept, innovation, command, signification, revocation, abolition, decree, and will, or dare to go against it with rash audacity. If anyone, however, should presume to attempt this, let him know he will incur the indignation of Almighty God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.
Given at Rome, at Saint Peter’s, in the year of the Lord’s Incarnation 1569, on the fourth day before the Kalends of March, in the fourth year of our pontificate.
Dated February 26, 1569; pontificate year 4.
Source. Bullarium Romanum, Taurinensis Edition, Vol. VII, pp. 740–742. Pope Pius V, Hebraeorum gens. Translated from the Latin.