 In the early Middle Ages, Jewish custom, in regard to beards, followed the fashions of each nation; in Germany, France, and Italy, Jews removed their beards, but in Islamic nations, Jews grew them long.In 1720, a mild confrontation arose between a group of Italian Jews, who had migrated to Salonica in the Ottoman Empire, and the local Jewish population, because the migrant Italians didn't wear beards, but the local population insisted that beards should be worn.It was later remarked by Jacob Emden that the Jewish population in western Europe had objected to these regulations so much that it had been impractical to enforce them; there had also been prominent opponents of beards, such as Joseph Solomon Delmedigo, to whom is attributed the epigram