GABERDINE, or GABARDINE  , any long, loose over-garment, reaching to the feet and girt round the waist . It was, when made of coarse material,commonly worn in the middle ages by pilgrims, beggars and almsmen . The Jews, conservatively attached to the loose and flowing garments of the East, continued to wear the long upper garment to which the name " gaberdine " couldbe applied, long after it had ceased to be a common form as worn by non-Jews, and to this day in some parts of Europe, e.g. in Poland, it is still worn, while the tendency to wear the frock-coat very long and loose, is a marked characteristic of the race . The fact that in the middle ages the Jews were forbidden to engage in handicrafts also, no doubt, tended to stereotype a form of dress unfitted for manual labour . The idea of the " gaberdine " being enforced by law upon the Jews as a distinctive garment is probably due to Shakespeare's use in the Merchant of Venice, I. iii . 113 . The mark that the Jews were obliged to wear generally on the outer garment was the badge . This was first enforced by the fourth Lateran Council of 1215 . The " badge " (Lat. rota; Fr. rouelle, wheel) took generally the shape of a circle of cloth worn on the breast . It varied in colour at different times . In France it was of yellow, later of red and white; in England it took the form of two bands or stripes, first of white, then of yellow . In Edward I.'s reign it was made in the shape of the Tables of the Law (see the Jewish Encyclopedia, s.v .

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Costume" and " Badge ") . The derivation of the word is obscure . It apparently occurs first in O . Fr. in the forms gauverdine, galvardine, and thence into Ital. as gavardina, and Span. gabardina, a form which has influenced the English word . The New English Dictionary suggests a connexion with the O.H . Ger. wallevart, pilgrimage . Skeat (Etym . Diet., 1898) refers it to Span. gaban, coat, cloak; cabana, hut, cabin .