Which type of bread should be used in the Eucharist ceremony was a hotly contested issue between the Western Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox churches, and one of the reasons for their historic schism in 1054.
The Catholic Church identifies the Last Supper with the Passover seder meal, and its consecrated bread is therefore unleavened, like matzah. The Orthodox Church, by contrast, places the Last Supper at an earlier date, emphasizing its proximity to the timing of the paschal sacrifice, and therefore sanctifies leavened bread. The various meanings associated with the consecrated bread find expression in the images impressed on the dough with special stamps. Bread stamps from the sixth and seventh centuries CE, discovered in this region, attest to the antiquity of this custom.

In Israel there are some twenty-four different Christian denominations, which have developed a rich variety of baking traditions and ways of consecrating and distributing the bread - and, of course, a wealth of bread stamps. Most of the stamps shown here belong to the Eastern Church.