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mirrored the principles that had been set out in Roman law.16 Theoderic’s
edictum explicitly stated that Jews were to enjoy the traditional privileges con-
ferred upon them in Roman law, giving them legal protection for their persons
and places of worship.17 A similar emphasis is expressed in letters written by
Cassiodorus in Theoderic’s name to the Jewish communities of Genoa and
Milan and preserved in the Variae. For instance, Theoderic confirmed the
long-standing legal rights of the Milanese Jewish community to maintain their
synagogue with the proviso that the Jews remain separate from the Christian
community.18 To the Jews of Genoa the king granted the right to rebuild the
roof of their decaying synagogue so long as the building was not expanded and
no ostentatious decorations were added.19 The language and content of these
letters carefully articulates the conditions under which Jews enjoyed legal
protection in Ostrogothic Italy: they were to remain inferior to Christians and
their places of worship smaller and less grand. It is worth noting that the king’s
oft-quoted dictum to the Genoese Jews that “no one can be forced to believe
against his will” also declares that the Jews were “destitute of God’s grace” and
condemns their errant prayers.20 Likewise in his above-mentioned letter grant-
ing protection to the Jews of Milan, Theoderic wonders why the Jews seek quies
in this world when they cannot find aeterna requies in the next.21 Still, Italy’s
Jews may well have preferred the status quo maintained by Theoderic and his
successors to the policies of Justinian; the Jews of Naples fought on the side of
the Ostrogoths against Belisarius during the siege of the city in 536.22
16 See the introduction to and translation of Theoderic’s legislation pertaining to the
Jews of Italy in Linder, Jews in the Legal Sources, pp. 200–6. On Theoderic’s policies as
a return to traditional Roman imperial attitudes towards the Jews see Brennecke,
Imitatio—reparatio—continuatio.
17 Edictum Theoderici regis 14, ed. F. Bluhme, Monumenta Germaniae Historica Leges natio-
num Germanicarum, Hanover 1889, vol. 5, pp. 145–79. English translation in Lafferty, Law
and Society, pp. 243–94 cited at p. 290. Some scholars are not entirely convinced that the
Edictum Theoderici can be attributed to Theoderic. See Arnold, Theoderic and the Roman
Imperial Restoration, p. 129, n. 41.
18 Cassiodorus, Variae (cited hereafter as Va r.) 5.37, ed. Mommsen.
19 Va r. 2.27.
20 Va r. 2.27. “... divinitatis gratia destituti.. .”; “damus quidem permissum, sed errantium
votum laudabiliter improbamus: religionem imperare non possumus, quia nemo cogitur
ut credat invitus.” On this phrase of Theoderic’s, see Moorhead, Theoderic, p. 97 and n. 147.
21 Va r. 5.37. “Sed quid, Iudaee, supplicans temporalem quietem quaeris, si aeternam requiem
invenire non possis?”
22 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, 1.8.41, 1.10.24–26, ed. and trans. Dewing, London 1919. On
Justinian see de Lange, “Jews in the Age of Justinian”.