WARNING: The following contains source citations that use racist language.

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In the 15^th century, Zurichers changed their residence approximately every five years. Within this active movement, the house name was often the only stable element that held entire streets together over long periods of time. It served as orientation, identification and clarification of ownership. For example, a deed of sale from 1443 refers to the change of ownership of the "hus zum Morenkopff", which we associate today with the address Neumarkt 13. Another source proves that in 1467, the silk embroiderer Jörg Rott and his family lived there and paid five pounds in taxes for it.

Several houses in Zurich from the 14^th and 15^th centuries bear the term "M***" in their names, as does another house at Marktgasse 19 from the 16^th century, which was known as "M***könig". Such house names are not specific to Zurich and can be found in numerous late medieval towns. But how did the contemporaries of that time interpret this, from today's point of view, racist term?

In the early Middle Ages, from the 6^th to the 11^th century,  the term "M***" was a designation of origin and can be traced back to the Latin loanword "maurus". Increasingly, however, it merged with the Greek term "moros", which means foolish and godless. This conflation of words also reflects the view of "Christian Europe" on the "Muslim world". The controversial term consequently referred both to inhabitants of Mauritania and to the whole of Africa, as well as to Muslims. 

There was little direct contact in Europe with people referred to as “M***” until the Crusades in the 11^th century. Nevertheless, numerous figures with explicitly black skin color appeared in theological texts and images, which embodied the negative, sin, and evil. Until the late Middle Ages, horror images of grotesque black demons and devils with African features were spread.

As long-distance trade intensified from the 11^th century onward, contacts with people from the Arab and African regions increased. This was accompanied by the emergence of more pictorial representations of so-called "M***". These representations were ambivalent. On the one hand, black people were depicted as less human or as torturers of Christ, but on the other hand, there were also examples of positive depictions, such as those of St. Mauritius, the three kings, or individual African, non-Christian people who behaved in a "virtuous" manner. In Zurich and in southern Germany, however, there are no black depictions of St. Mauritius or of the city saints Felix and Regula, all three of whom belonged to the Theban Legion and who were described as "moren" in an imperial chronicle in 1160.

Art of the late Middle Ages showed less variety of skin tones. Higher-ranking Christian people were increasingly depicted with white skin. Black people, on the other hand, were increasingly depicted in a derogatory manner. In the process, clichés were taken up that continued to be prominent in modern racism. Religious and cultural attributions were increasingly linked to external characteristics. On the Iberian Peninsula, for example, fundamental differences between people were asserted as early as the 15^th century, in order to deny certain people rights and privileges.

This change in meaning emphasizes the ambivalence toward "M***", strongly characterized by exclusion and demarcation. While the term did not yet have racist connotations during silk embroiderer Jörg Rott’s lifetime in the 15^th century, it increasingly became a symbol of exoticism and foreignness. This is the history of the term's use today, not merely its "original" meaning.