Judenporzellan

Judenporzellan (literally "Jewish Porcelain") is a designation for inferior porcelain produced by the Royal Porcelain Factory owned by Frederick the Great in the late 18th century. In order to increase business, he decreed in 1769 that a tax on Jews in the form of coerced purchases from his factory would be levied on Jews in order to obtain marriage, death, business and other certificates and permits (Glueck 1998). Some accounts claim that the twenty porcelain monkeys belonging to the heirs of Moses Mendelssohn (1729–1786) are Judenporzellan (Hartmann 2006), although some authorities doubt the authenticity of these family stories based on chronology and provenance—at least one of the monkeys is of Meissen manufacture (Todd 2003).