Romani people

Not to be confused with Romanians, an unrelated ethnic group and nation, nor with modern or ancient Romans, also unrelated.
Romani people
Rromane dźene

Romani flag created in 1933 and accepted by the 1971 World Romani Congress
Total population
2 million ~ 12 million[1][2][3]
Also see Romani people by country
Regions with significant populations
 United States 1,000,000
(0.32%)[4]
 Brazil 800,000
(0.41%)[5]
 Spain 650,000
(1.62%)[6]
 Romania 621,573
(3.3%)[7]
 Turkey 500,000
(0.72%)[8]
 France 500,000
(0.79%)[9]
 Bulgaria 370,908
(4.67%)[10]
 Hungary 205,720
(2.02%)[11]
 Greece 200,000
(1.82%)[12]
 Slovakia 189,920
(1.71%)[13]
 Russia 182,766
(0.13%)[14]
 Serbia 147,604
(2.05%)[15]
 Italy 130,000
(0.22%)[16]
 Germany 120,000
(0.15%)[17]
 United Kingdom 90,000
(0.15%)[18]
 Macedonia 53,879
(2.85%)[19]
 Mexico 53,000
(0.05%)[20]
 Sweden 50,000 – 100,000[21]
 Ukraine 47,587
(0.098%)[22]
 Portugal 30,000 – 50,000
(0.3%)
 Finland 10,000 – 15,000
(0.3%)
Languages
Romani, languages of native region
Religion
Christianity[23]
Islam[23]
Shaktism[23]
Related ethnic groups
Dom, Lom, Domba; other Indo-Aryans

Part of a series on
Romani people
  • Romani people portal
  • WikiProject
Romani Wagon in Germany in 1935
Romani wagon pictured in 2009 in Grandborough (Grandborough Fields Road is a popular spot for travelling people)

The Romani (also spelled Romany), or Roma, are a traditionally itinerant ethnicity living mostly in Europe and the Americas.[24][25] Ultimately of Northern Indian origin, the Romani are widely known among English-speaking people by the exonym "Gypsies" (or Gipsies). Other exonyms are Ashkali and Balkan Egyptians and Sinti.

Romani are dispersed, with their concentrated populations in Europe—especially Central and Eastern Europe and Anatolia, Spain and Southern France. They originated in India and arrived in Mid-West Asia, then Europe, around 1,000 years ago,[26] either separating from the Dom people or, at least, having a similar history;[27] the ancestors of both the Romani and the Dom left North India sometime between the sixth and eleventh century.[26]

Since the nineteenth century, some Romani have also migrated to the Americas. There are an estimated one million Roma in the United States;[4] and 800,000 in Brazil, most of whose ancestors emigrated in the nineteenth century from eastern Europe. Brazil also includes some Romani descended from people deported by the government of Portugal during the Inquisition in the colonial era.[28] In migrations since the late nineteenth century, Romani have also moved to other countries in South America and to Canada.[29]

The Romani language is divided into several dialects, which add up to an estimated number of speakers larger than two million.[30] The total number of Romani people is at least twice as large (several times as large according to high estimates). Many Romani are native speakers of the language current in their country of residence, or of mixed languages combining the two; those varieties are sometimes called Para-Romani.[31]

Names

Romani usage

In the Romani language, Rom is a masculine noun, meaning 'man of the Roma ethnic group' or 'man, husband', with the plural Roma. The feminine of Rom in the Romani language is Romni. However, in most cases, in other languages Rom is now used for both a man and a woman.[32]

Romani is the feminine adjective, while romano is the masculine adjective. Some Romanies use Rom or Roma as an ethnic name, while others (such as the Sinti, or the Romanichal) do not use this term as a self-ascription for the entire ethnic group.[33]

Sometimes, rom and romani are spelled with a double r, i.e., rrom and rromani. In this case rr is used to represent the phoneme /ʀ/ (also written as ř and rh), which in some Romani dialects has remained different from the one written with a single r. The rr spelling is common in certain institutions (such as the INALCO Institute in Paris), or used in certain countries, e.g. Romania, in order to distinguish from the endonym/homonym for Romanians (sg. român, pl. români).[32][34]

English usage

In the English language (according to the Oxford English Dictionary), Rom is a noun (with the plural Roma or Roms) and an adjective, while Romani (Romany) is also a noun (with the plural Romanies or Romanis) and an adjective. Both Rom and Romani have been in use in English since the 19th century as an alternative for Gypsy. Romani was initially spelled Rommany, then Romany, while today the Romani spelling is the most popular spelling. Occasionally, the double r spelling (e.g., Rroma, Rromani) mentioned above is also encountered in English texts.

The term Roma is increasingly encountered during recent decades,[35][36] as a generic term for the Romani people.[37][38][39][40]

Because all Romanies use the word Romani as an adjective, the term began to be used as a noun for the entire ethnic group.[41] Today, the term Romani is used by some organizations — including the United Nations and the US Library of Congress.[34]

However, the Council of Europe and other organizations consider that Roma is the correct term referring to all related groups, regardless of their country of origin, and recommend that Romani be restricted to the language and culture: Romani language, Romani culture.[32]

The standard assumption is that the demonyms of the Romani people, Lom and Dom share the same origin.[42][43]

Other designations

The English term Gypsy (or Gipsy) originates from the Middle English gypcian, short for Egipcien. It is ultimately derived from the Greek Αἰγύπτιοι (Aigyptioi), meaning Egyptian, via Middle French and Latin. This designation owes its existence to the belief, common in the Middle Ages, that the Romani, or some related group (such as the middle eastern Dom people), were itinerant Egyptians.[44][45] According to one narrative they were exiled from Egypt as punishment for allegedly harbouring the infant Jesus.[46] As described in Victor Hugo's novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the medieval French referred to the Romanies as Egyptiens. The word Gypsy in English has become so pervasive that many Romani organizations use it in their own organizational names.

This exonym is sometimes written with capital letter, to show that it designates an ethnic group.[47] The term 'Gypsy' appears when international research programmes, documents and policies on the community are referred to. However, the word is often considered derogatory because of its negative and stereotypical associations.[38][39][48][49][50][51][52] The Council of Europe consider that 'Gypsy' or equivalent terms, as well as administrative terms such as 'Gens du Voyage' (referring in fact to an ethnic group but not acknowledging ethnic identification) are not in line with European recommendations.[32] In North America, the word Gypsy is most commonly used as a reference to Romani ethnicity,[53] though lifestyle and fashion are at times also referenced by using this word.[54]

Another common designation of the Romani people is Cingane (alt. Tsinganoi, Zigar, Zigeuner) which probably derives from Athinganoi, the name of a Christian sect with whom the Romani (or some related group) became associated with in the Middle Ages.[45][55][56][57] The Spanish term gitano and the French term gitan have a more uncertain origin but could originate from any of the two main designations mentioned above or their conflation and corruption.[58]

Population and subgroups

Romani population

For a variety of reasons, many Romanies choose not to register their ethnic identity in official censuses. There are an estimated four million Romani people in Europe (as of 2002),[59] although some high estimates by Romani organizations give numbers as high as 14 million.[60] Significant Romani populations are found in the Balkans, in some Central European states, in Spain, France, Russia and Ukraine. Several million more Romanies may live out of Europe, in particular in the Middle East and in the Americas.

A tent of Romani nomads in Hungary, 19th century

Romani subgroups

As a result of the caste system, inherited from India, and their movement on Asia, Europe, America and Australia, many designations can be given to individual Roma groups. [61][62]

Interior of a gipsy's house in Brazil c. 1820, by Debret
Camping gypsies near Düsseldorf, Germany, c. 1905, by Emil Volkers

All-encompassing self-description is always "Rom".[63] Even when some groups are not using an endonym "Roma", they all acknowledge a common origin and a dichotomy Roma-Gadjo.[64]

Other groups, using different endonyms are, for example:

Other Romani sub-groups include:

Two Romani women in Spain, by Francisco Iturrino

History

Origins

Findings suggest an Indian origin for Roma.[81][82] Because Romani groups did not keep chronicles of their history or have oral accounts of it, most hypotheses about the Romani's migration early history are based on linguistic theory.[83] There is also no known record of a migration from India to Europe from medieval times that can be connected indisputably to Roma.[84]

Shahnameh legend

An illustration of "Bahrām V Gōr and the Indian princess in the black pavilion."

According to a legend reported in Shahnameh and repeated by several modern authors, the Sasanian king Bahrām V Gōr learned towards the end of his reign (421–39) that the poor could not afford to enjoy music, and he asked the king of India to send him ten thousand luris, men and women, lute playing experts. When the luris arrived, Bahrām gave each one an ox and a donkey and a donkey-load of wheat so that they could live on agriculture and play music gratuitously for the poor. But the luris ate the oxen and the wheat and came back a year later with their cheeks hollowed with hunger. The king, angered with their having wasted what he had given them, ordered them to pack up their bags on their asses and go wandering around the world.[85]

Linguistic evidence

The linguistic evidence has indisputably shown that roots of Romani language lie in India: the language has grammatical characteristics of Indian languages and shares with them a big part of the basic lexicon, for example, body parts or daily routines.[86]

More exactly, Romani shares the basic lexicon with Hindi and Punjabi. It shares many phonetic features with Marwari, while its grammar is closest to Bengali.[87]

Romani and Domari share some similarities: agglutination of postpositions of the second Layer (or case marking clitics) to the nominal stem, concordmarkers for the past tense, the neutralisation of gender marking in the plural, and the use of the oblique case as an accusative.[88][89] This has prompted much discussion about the relationships between these two languages. Domari was once thought to be the "sister language" of Romani, the two languages having split after the departure from the Indian subcontinent, but more recent research suggests that the differences between them are significant enough to treat them as two separate languages within the Central zone (Hindustani) group of languages. The Dom and the Rom therefore likely descend from two different migration waves out of India, separated by several centuries.[27][90]

Numerals in the Romani, Domari and Lomavren languages, with Hindi and Persian forms for comparison.[91] Note that Romani 7–9 are borrowed from Greek.

Hindi Romani Domari Lomavren Persian
1 ek ekh, jekh yika yak, yek yak, yek
2 do duj dī lui du, do
3 tīn trin tærən tərin se
4 cār štar štar išdör čahār
5 pāñc pandž pandž pendž pandž
6 che šov šaš šeš šaš, šeš
7 sāt ifta xaut haft haft
8 āţh oxto xaišt hašt hašt
9 nau inja na nu nuh, noh
10 das deš des las dah
20 bīs biš wīs vist bist
100 sau šel saj saj sad

Genetic evidence

Genetic findings in 2012 suggest the Romani originated in northwest India and migrated as a group.[81][82][92] According to a genetic study in 2012, the ancestors of present scheduled tribes and scheduled caste populations of northern India, traditionally referred to collectively as the Ḍoma, are the likely ancestral populations of modern European Roma.[93] In December 2012, additional findings appeared to confirm the "Roma came from a single group that left northwestern India about 1,500 years ago,"[82] They reached the Balkans about 900 years ago,[81] and then spread throughout Europe. The team found that, despite some isolation, the Roma were "genetically similar to other Europeans."[81][82]

Genetic research published in European Journal of Human Genetics "has revealed that over 70% of males belong to a single lineage that appears unique to the Roma"[94]

Genetic evidence supports the mediaeval migration from India. The Romani have been described as "a conglomerate of genetically isolated founder populations",[95] while a number of common Mendelian disorders among Romanies from all over Europe indicates "a common origin and founder effect".[95][96] A study from 2001 by Gresham et al. suggests "a limited number of related founders, compatible with a small group of migrants splitting from a distinct caste or tribal group".[97] The same study found that "a single lineage ... found across Romani populations, accounts for almost one-third of Romani males."[97] A 2004 study by Morar et al. concluded that the Romani population "was founded approximately 32–40 generations ago, with secondary and tertiary founder events occurring approximately 16–25 generations ago".[98]

Possible migration route

They may have emerged from the modern Indian state of Rajasthan,[99] migrating to the northwest (the Punjab region, Sindh and Baluchistan of the Indian subcontinent) around 250 BC. Their subsequent westward migration, possibly in waves, is now believed to have occurred beginning in about AD 500.[82] It has also been suggested that emigration from India may have taken place in the context of the raids by Mahmud of Ghazni.[100] As these soldiers were defeated, they were moved west with their families into the Byzantine Empire. The 11th century terminus post quem is due to the Romani language showing unambiguous features of the Modern Indo-Aryan languages,[101] precluding an emigration during the Middle Indic period.

The migration of the Romanies through the Middle East and Northern Africa to Europe

Arrival in Europe

Though according to a 2012 genomic study, the Romani reached the Balkans as early as the 12th century,[102] the first historical records of the Romani reaching south-eastern Europe are from the 14th century: in 1322, an Irish Franciscan monk, Symon Semeonis encountered a migrant group, "the descendants of Cain", outside the town of Heraklion (Candia), in Crete. Symon's account is probably the earliest surviving description by a Western chronicler of the Romani people in Europe. In 1350, Ludolphus of Sudheim mentioned a similar people with a unique language whom he called Mandapolos, a word which some theorize was derived from the Greek word mantes (meaning prophet or fortune teller).[103] Around 1360, a fiefdom, called the Feudum Acinganorum was established in Corfu, which mainly used Romani serfs and to which the Romani on the island were subservient.[104][105] By 1424, they were recorded in Germany; and by the 16th century, Scotland and Sweden. Some Romani migrated from Persia through North Africa, reaching the Iberian Peninsula in the 15th century. The two currents met in France.

First arrival of the Romanies outside Bern in the 15th century, described by the chronicler as getoufte heiden ("baptized heathens") and drawn with dark skin and wearing Saracen-style clothing and weapons (Spiezer Schilling, p. 749)

Early Modern history

An 1852 Wallachian poster advertising an auction of Romani slaves in Bucharest.

Their early history shows a mixed reception. Although 1385 marks the first recorded transaction for a Romani slave in Wallachia, they were issued safe conduct by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund in 1417.[106] Romanies were ordered expelled from the Meissen region of Germany in 1416, Lucerne in 1471, Milan in 1493, France in 1504, Catalonia in 1512, Sweden in 1525, England in 1530 (see Egyptians Act 1530), and Denmark in 1536.[106] In 1510, any Romani found in Switzerland were ordered to be put to death, with similar rules established in England in 1554, and Denmark in 1589, whereas Portugal began deportations of Romanies to its colonies in 1538.[106]

Later, a 1596 English statute, however, gave Romanies special privileges that other wanderers lacked; France passed a similar law in 1683. Catherine the Great of Russia declared the Romanies "crown slaves" (a status superior to serfs), but also kept them out of certain parts of the capital.[107] In 1595, Ştefan Răzvan overcame his birth into slavery, and became the Voivode (Prince) of Moldavia.[106]

Although some Romani could be kept as slaves in Wallachia and Moldavia until abolition in 1856, the majority were traveling as free nomads with their wagons, as alluded to in the spoked wheel symbol in the national flag.[108] Elsewhere in Europe, they were subject to ethnic cleansing, abduction of their children, and forced labor. In England, Romani were sometimes expelled from small communities or hanged; in France, they were branded and their heads were shaved; in Moravia and Bohemia, the women were marked by their ears being severed. As a result, large groups of the Romani moved to the East, toward Poland, which was more tolerant, and Russia, where the Romani were treated more fairly as long as they paid the annual taxes.[109]

Modern history

Romani began emigrating to North America in colonial times, with small groups recorded in Virginia and French Louisiana. Larger-scale Roma emigration to the United States began in the 1860s, with groups of Romanichal from Great Britain. The largest number immigrated in the early 1900s, mainly from the Vlax group of Kalderash. Many Romani also settled in South America.

Sinti and other Romani about to be deported from Germany, May 22, 1940.

World War II

Main article: Porajmos

During World War II, the Nazis embarked on a systematic genocide of the Romani, a process known in Romani as the Porajmos.[110] Romanies were marked for extermination and sentenced to forced labor and imprisonment in concentration camps.

They were often killed on sight, especially by the Einsatzgruppen (paramilitary death squads) on the Eastern Front.[111] The total number of victims has been variously estimated at between 220,000 to 1,500,000; even the lowest number would make the Porajmos one of the largest mass killings in history.[112]

Post-1945

In Czechoslovakia, they were labeled a "socially degraded stratum," and Romani women were sterilized as part of a state policy to reduce their population. This policy was implemented with large financial incentives, threats of denying future welfare payments, with misinformation, or after administering drugs (Silverman 1995; Helsinki Watch 1991).

An official inquiry from the Czech Republic, resulting in a report (December 2005), concluded that the Communist authorities had practiced an assimilation policy towards Romanies, which "included efforts by social services to control the birth rate in the Romani community". "The problem of sexual sterilisation carried out in the Czech Republic, either with improper motivation or illegally, exists," said Czech Public Defender of Rights, recommending state compensation for women affected between 1973 and 1991.[113] New cases were revealed up until 2004, in both the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Germany, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland "all have histories of coercive sterilization of minorities and other groups." [114]

Society and traditional culture

A Gipsy Family, facsimile of a woodcut in the Cosmographia of Sebastian Münster (Basle, 1552)

The traditional Romanies place a high value on the extended family. Virginity is essential in unmarried women. Both men and women often marry young; there has been controversy in several countries over the Romani practice of child marriage. Romani law establishes that the man's family must pay a bride price to the bride's parents, but only traditional families still follow this rule.

Once married, the woman joins the husband's family, where her main job is to tend to her husband's and her children's needs, as well as to take care of her in-laws. The power structure in the traditional Romani household has at its top the oldest man or grandfather, and men in general have more authority than women. Women gain respect and authority as they get older. Young wives begin gaining authority once they have children.

Romani social behavior is strictly regulated by Hindu purity laws ("marime" or "marhime"), still respected by most Roma (and by most older generations of Sinti). This regulation affects many aspects of life, and is applied to actions, people and things: parts of the human body are considered impure: the genital organs (because they produce emissions), as well as the rest of the lower body. Clothes for the lower body, as well as the clothes of menstruating women, are washed separately. Items used for eating are also washed in a different place. Childbirth is considered impure, and must occur outside the dwelling place. The mother is considered impure for forty days after giving birth.

Death is considered impure, and affects the whole family of the dead, who remain impure for a period of time. In contrast to the practice of cremating the dead, Romani dead must be buried.[115] Cremation and burial are both known from the time of the Rigveda, and both are widely practiced in Hinduism today (although the tendency is for Hindus groups for cremation, while some communities in South India tend to bury their dead).[116] Some animals are also considered impure, for instance cats because they lick their hindquarters. Horses, in contrast, are not considered impure because they cannot.[117]

Belonging and exclusion

Main articles: Romanipen and Gadjo (non-Romani)

Romanipen (also romanypen, romanipe, romanype, romanimos, romaimos, romaniya) is a complicated term of Romani philosophy that means totality of the Romani spirit, Romani culture, Romani Law, being a Romani, a set of Romani strains.

An ethnic Romani is considered to be a Gadjo (non-Romani) in the Romani society if he has no Romanipen. Sometimes a non-Romani may be considered to be a Romani if he has Romanipen; usually this is an adopted child. As a concept, Romanipen has been the subject of interest to numerous academic observers. It has been hypothesized that it owes more to a framework of culture rather than simply an adherence to historically received rules.[118]

Religion

Romanies predominately practice Christianity. Romani people believe in Devla (God) and Beng (The Devil). Some Romani people adhere to paganism and Hinduism.

Christian Romanies during the pilgrimage at Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer in France, 1980s

Beliefs

The ancestors of modern day Romani people were previously Hindu, but adopted Christianity or Islam depending on their respective regions they had migrated through.[119] Muslim Roma are found in Turkey, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Egypt, Kosovo, Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria and form a very significant proportion of the Romani people. In neighbouring countries such as Greece most of the Romani inhabitants follow the practice of Orthodoxy. It is likely that the adherence to differing religions prevented families from engaging in intermarriage.[120]

Deities and saints

Blessed Ceferino Giménez Malla is considered a patron saint of the Romani people in Roman Catholicism.[121] Saint Sarah, or Kali Sara, has also been venerated as a patron saint in the same manner as the Blessed Ceferino Giménez Malla. Since the turn of the 21st century, Kali Sara is understood to have been an Indian deity brought from India by the refugee ancestors of the Roma people; as the Roma became Christianized, she was absorbed in a syncretic way and worshipped as a saint.[122]

Mother Goddess figurines have been found in the excavations of the Indus Valley Civilisation in Mohenjo Daro and Harappa, in the Sindh - Punjab - Haryana area [Some Romani claim Punjab to be their original habitat], and Kali Mata [Mother Kali] is still worshipped in India, particularly by the Hindus. Therefore, Saint Sarah is now increasingly being considered as "a Romani Goddess, the Protectress of the Roma" and an "indisputable link with Mother India".[122][123]

Ceremonies and practices

Romanies often adopt the dominant religion of their host country in the event that a ceremony associated with a formal religious institution is necessary, such as a baptism or funeral (their particular belief systems and indigenous religion and worship remain preserved regardless of such adoption processes). The Roma continue to practice "Shaktism", a practice with origins in India, whereby a female consort is required for the worship of a god. Adherence to this practice means that for the Roma who worship a Christian God, prayer is conducted through the Virgin Mary, or her mother, Saint Anne—Shaktism continues over one thousand years after the people's separation from India.[124]

Besides the Roma elders, who serve as spiritual leaders, priests, churches, or bibles do not exist among the Romanies—the only exception is the Pentecostal Roma.[124]

Balkans

Costume of a Romani woman (most likely Muslim Roma).

For the Roma communities that have resided in the Balkans for numerous centuries, often referred to as "Turkish Gypsies", the following histories apply for religious beliefs:

Muslim Romanies in Bosnia and Herzegovina (around 1900)

Other regions

Gypsys in Germany, 1910

In Ukraine and Russia the Roma populations are also Muslim as the families of Balkan migrants continue to live in these locations. Their ancestors settled on the Crimean peninsula during the 17th and 18th centuries, but then migrated to Ukraine, southern Russia and the Povolzhie (along the Volga River). Formally, Islam is the religion that these communities align themselves with and the people are recognized for their staunch preservation of the Romani language and identity.[126]

Most Eastern European Romanies are Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Muslim. Those in Western Europe and the United States are mostly Roman Catholic or Protestant—in southern Spain, many Romanies are Pentecostal, but this is a small minority that has emerged in contemporary times.[124] In Egypt, the Romanies are split into Christian and Muslim populations.

Music

Main article: Romani music
Young Hungarian Romani performing a traditional dance

Romani music plays an important role in Central and Eastern European countries such as Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Albania, Hungary, Slovenia and Romania, and the style and performance practices of Romani musicians have influenced European classical composers such as Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms. The lăutari who perform at traditional Romanian weddings are virtually all Romani.

Probably the most internationally prominent contemporary performers in the lăutari tradition are Taraful Haiducilor. Bulgaria's popular "wedding music", too, is almost exclusively performed by Romani musicians such as Ivo Papasov, a virtuoso clarinetist closely associated with this genre and Bulgarian pop-folk singer Azis.

Many famous classical musicians, such as the Hungarian pianist Georges Cziffra, are Romani, as are many prominent performers of manele. Zdob şi Zdub, one of the most prominent rock bands in Moldova, although not Romanies themselves, draw heavily on Romani music, as do Spitalul de Urgenţă in Romania, Shantel in Germany, Goran Bregović in Serbia, Darko Rundek in Croatia, Beirut and Gogol Bordello in the United States.

Another tradition of Romani music is the genre of the Romani brass band, with such notable practitioners as Boban Marković of Serbia, and the brass lăutari groups Fanfare Ciocărlia and Fanfare din Cozmesti of Romania.

Many musical instruments like violins and guitars are said to have originated from the Romani. Many dances such as the flamenco of Spain and Oriental dances of Egypt are also said to have originated from them.[128]

The distinctive sound of Romani music has also strongly influenced bolero, jazz, and flamenco (especially cante jondo) in Europe. European-style gypsy jazz ("jazz Manouche" or "Sinti jazz") is still widely practiced among the original creators (the Romanie People); one who acknowledged this artistic debt was guitarist Django Reinhardt. Contemporary artists in this tradition known internationally include Stochelo Rosenberg, Biréli Lagrène, Jimmy Rosenberg, Paulus Schäfer and Tchavolo Schmitt.

The Romanies of Turkey have achieved musical acclaim from national and local audiences. Local performers usually perform for special holidays. Their music is usually performed on instruments such as the darbuka, gırnata and cümbüş.[129]

Cuisine

A traditional Romani dessert is pirogo. The recipe consists of eggs, raisins, walnuts, pineapple, sugar, butter, egg noodles and cottage cheese.[130] Another traditional dish cooked by Romani people is salmaia which is made with stuffed cabbage, meat and rice.[131]

Contemporary art and culture

Language

Main article: Romani language

Most Romani speak one of several dialects of the Romani language,[132] an Indo-Aryan language, with roots in Sanskrit. They also will often speak the languages of the countries they live in. Typically, they also incorporate loanwords and calques into Romani from the languages of those countries and especially words for terms that the Romani language does not have. Most of the Ciganos of Portugal, the Gitanos of Spain, the Romanichal of the UK, and Scandinavian Travellers have lost their knowledge of pure Romani, and respectively speak the mixed languages Caló,[133] Angloromany, and Scandoromani. Most of the speaker communities in these regions consist of later immigrants from eastern or central Europe.[134]

There are no concrete statistics for the number of Romani speakers, both in Europe and globally. However, a conservative estimation has been made at 3.5 million speakers in Europe and a further 500,000 elsewhere,[135] although the actual number may be considerably higher. This makes Romani the second largest minority language in Europe, behind Catalan.[136]

In relation to dialect diversity, Romani works in the same way as most other European languages.[137] Cross-dialect communication is dominated by the following features:

a) All Romani speakers are bilingual, and are accustomed to borrowing words or phrases from a second language; this makes it difficult when trying to communicate with Romani's from different countries

b) Romani was traditionally a language shared between extended family and a close-knit community. This has resulted in the inability to comprehend dialects from other countries. This is the reason Romani is sometimes associated as being number of different languages.

c) There is no tradition or example of a literary Standard for Romani speakers to use as a guideline for their language use.[137]

Persecutions

Main article: Antiziganism

Historical persecution

One of the most enduring persecutions against the Romani people was their being enslaved. Slavery was widely practiced in medieval Europe, including the territory of present-day Romania from before the founding of the principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia in the 13th–14th century.[138] Legislation decreed that all the Romani living in these states, as well as any others who immigrated there, were classified as slaves.[139] Slavery was gradually abolished during the 1840s and 1850s.[138]

The exact origins of slavery in the Danubian Principalities are not known. There is some debate over whether the Romani people came to Wallachia and Moldavia as free men or were brought as slaves. Historian Nicolae Iorga associated the Roma people's arrival with the 1241 Mongol invasion of Europe and considered their slavery as a vestige of that era, in which the Romanians took the Roma as slaves from the Mongols and preserved their status to use their labor. Other historians believe that the Romani were enslaved, while captured during the battles, with the Tatars. The practice of enslaving war prisoners may also have been adopted from the Mongols.[138]

Some Romani may have been slaves or auxiliary troops of the Mongols or Tatars, but most of them migrated from south of the Danube at the end of the 14th century, some time after the foundation of Wallachia. By then, the institution of slavery was already established in Moldavia and possibly in both principalities. After the Roma migrated into the area, slavery became a widespread practice by the majority population. The Tatar slaves, smaller in numbers, were eventually merged into the Roma population.[140]

Some branches of the Romani people reached Western Europe in the 15th century, fleeing as refugees from the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. Although the Romani were refugees from the conflicts in southeastern Europe, they were often suspected by the local populations in the West as being associated with the Ottoman invasion because of their physical features seemed related to the Turks. (The German Reichstags at Landau and Freiburg in 1496-1498 declared the Romani to be spies of the Turks). In Western Europe, such suspicions and discrimination against a people who were a visible minority resulted in persecution, often violent, with efforts to achieve ethnic cleansing until the modern era. In times of social tension, the Romani suffered as scapegoats; for instance, they were accused of bringing the plague during times of epidemics. Jews, another non-assimilated minority, also suffered at the hands of the majority culture.[141]

In 1749 Spain conducted The Great Roundup of Romani (Gitanos) in its territory. The Spanish Crown ordered a nationwide raid that led to the break-up of families as all able-bodied men were interned into forced labor camps.

Later in the 19th century, Romani immigration was forbidden on a racial basis in areas outside Europe, mostly in the English-speaking world. (Argentina in 1880 prohibited immigration by Roma, as did the United States in 1885.)[141]

Deportation of Roma from Asperg, Germany, 1940 (photograph by the Rassenhygienische Forschungsstelle)

Holocaust

Main article: Porajmos

The persecution of the Romanies reached a peak during World War II in the Porajmos, the genocide perpetrated by the Nazis during the Holocaust. In 1935, the Nuremberg laws stripped the Romani people living in Nazi Germany of their citizenship, after which they were subjected to violence, imprisonment in concentration camps and later genocide in extermination camps. The policy was extended in areas occupied by the Nazis during the war, and it was also applied by their allies, notably the Independent State of Croatia, Romania and Hungary. Despite being "Indo-Aryans", the Romanis were considered "non-Aryans" by the Nazis.

Because no accurate pre-war census figures exist for the Romanis, it is impossible to accurately assess the actual number of victims. Ian Hancock, director of the Program of Romani Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, proposes a figure of up to a million and a half, while an estimate of between 220,000 and 500,000 was made by Sybil Milton, formerly senior historian of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.[142] In Central Europe, the extermination in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was so thorough that the Bohemian Romani language became extinct.

Forced assimilation

In the Habsburg Monarchy under Maria Theresa (1740–1780), a series of decrees tried to force the Romanies to permanently settle, removed rights to horse and wagon ownership (1754), renamed them as "New Citizens" and forced Romani boys into military service if they had no trade (1761), forced them to register with the local authorities (1767), and prohibited marriage between Romanies (1773). Her successor Josef II prohibited the wearing of traditional Romani clothing and the use of the Romani language, punishable by flogging.[143]

In Spain, attempts to assimilate the Gitanos were under way as early as 1619, when Gitanos were forcibly settled, the use of the Romani language was prohibited, Gitano men and women were sent to separate workhouses and their children sent to orphanages. Similar prohibitions took place in 1783 under King Charles III, who prohibited the nomadic lifestyle, the use of the Calo language, Romani clothing, their trade in horses and other itinerant trades. The use of the word gitano was also forbidden to further assimilation. Ultimately these measures failed, as the rest of the population rejected the integration of the Gitanos.[143][144]

Other examples of forced assimilation include Norway, where a law was passed in 1896 permitting the state to remove children from their parents and place them in state institutions.[145] This resulted in some 1,500 Romani children being taken from their parents in the 20th century.[146]

Contemporary issues

Roma estimate percentage of population in European countries[147]
Country Percent
Bulgaria
  
 10.33%
Macedonia
  
 9.80%
Slovakia
  
 9.17%
Romania
  
 8.32%
Serbia
  
 8.18%
Hungary
  
 7.05%
Turkey
  
 3.83%
Albania
  
 3.18%
Montenegro
  
 2.95%
Moldova
  
 2.49%
Greece
  
 2.47%
Czech Republic
  
 1.96%
Spain
  
 1.62%
Kosovo
  
 1.47%
Figures for Serbia include 23-50,000 Kosovo Roma IDPs[148]
Distribution of the Romani people in Europe (2007 Council of Europe "average estimates", totalling 9.8 million)[149]

Discrimination against the Romani people has continued to the present day,[150][151] although efforts are being made to address them.[152] Amnesty International reports continued instances of Antizigan discrimination during the 20th Century, particularly in Romania, Serbia,[153] Slovakia,[154] Hungary,[155] Slovenia,[156] and Kosovo.[157] The European Union has recognized that the discrimination the Romani people face needs to be addressed and with the national Roma integration strategy they are encouraging member states to work towards greater Romani inclusion and upholding the rights of the Romani in the European union.[158]

The Romanis of Kosovo have been severely persecuted by ethnic Albanians since the end of the Kosovo War, and the region's Romani community is regarded to be for the most part annihilated.[159]

Czechoslovakia carried out a policy of sterilization of Romani women, starting in 1973.[160] The dissidents of the Charter 77 denounced it in 1977-78 as a genocide, but the practice continued through the Velvet Revolution of 1989.[161] A 2005 report by the Czech government's independent ombudsman, Otakar Motejl, identified dozens of cases of coercive sterilization between 1979 and 2001, and called for criminal investigations and possible prosecution against several health care workers and administrators.[162]

In 2008, following the brutal rape and subsequent murder of an Italian woman in Rome at the hands of a young man from a local Romani encampment,[163] the Italian government declared that Italy's Romani population represented a national security risk and that swift action was required to address the emergenza nomadi (nomad emergency).[164] Specifically, officials in the Italian government accused the Romanies of being responsible for rising crime rates in urban areas. One police raid in 2007 freed many of the children belonging to a Romani gang who used to steal by day, and who were locked in a shed by night by members of the gang.[165]

The 2008 deaths of Cristina and Violetta Djeordsevic, two Roma children who drowned while Italian beach-goers remained unperturbed, brought international attention to the relationship between Italians and the Roma people. Reviewing the state of play in 2012, one Belgian magazine observed:

On International Roma Day, which falls on 8 April, the significant proportion of Europe's 12 million Roma who live in deplorable conditions will not have much to celebrate. And poverty is not the only worry for the community. Ethnic tensions are on the rise. In 2008, Roma camps came under attack in Italy, intimidation by racist parliamentarians is the norm in Hungary. Speaking in 1993, Václav Havel prophetically remarked that "the treatment of the Roma is a litmus test for democracy": and democracy has been found wanting. The consequences of the transition to capitalism have been disastrous for the Roma. Under communism they had jobs, free housing and schooling. Now many are unemployed, many are losing their homes and racism is increasingly rewarded with impunity.[166]

Forced repatriation

In the summer of 2010 French authorities demolished at least 51 illegal Roma camps and began the process of repatriating their residents to their countries of origin.[167] This followed tensions between the French state and Roma communities, which had been heightened after French police opened fire and killed a traveller who drove through a police checkpoint, hitting an officer, and attempted to hit two more officers at another checkpoint. In retaliation a group of Roma, armed with hatchets and iron bars, attacked the police station of Saint-Aignan, toppled traffic lights and road signs and burned three cars.[168][169] The French government has been accused of perpetrating these actions to pursue its political agenda.[170] EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding stated that the European Commission should take legal action against France over the issue, calling the deportations "a disgrace". Purportedly, a leaked file dated 5 August, sent from the Interior Ministry to regional police chiefs included the instruction: "Three hundred camps or illegal settlements must be cleared within three months, Roma camps are a priority."[171]

Fictional representations

Vincent van Gogh: The Caravans – Gypsy Camp near Arles (1888, oil on canvas)

Many fictional depictions of Romani people in literature and art present romanticized narratives of their supposed mystical powers of fortune telling or their supposed irascible or passionate temper paired with an indomitable love of freedom and a habit of criminality. Particularly notable are classics like the story Carmen by Prosper Mérimée and the opera based on it by Georges Bizet, Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Herge's The Castafiore Emerald and Miguel de Cervantes' La Gitanilla.

The Romani were also heavily romanticized in the Soviet Union, a classic example being the 1975 Tabor ukhodit v Nebo. A more realistic depiction of contemporary Romani in the Balkans, featuring Romani lay actors speaking in their native dialects, although still playing with established clichés of a Romani penchant for both magic and crime, was presented by Emir Kusturica in his Time of the Gypsies (1988) and Black Cat, White Cat (1998). The films of Tony Gatlif, a French director of Romani ethnicity, like Les Princes (1983), Latcho Drom (1993) and Gadjo Dilo (1997) also portray gypsy life.

In contemporary literature

The Romani ethnicity is often used for characters in contemporary fantasy literature. In such literature, the Romani are often portrayed as possessing archaic occult knowledge passed down through the ages. This frequent use of the ethnicity has given rise to 'gypsy archetypes' in popular contemporary literature. A UK example is the Freya Trilogy by Elizabeth Arnold.

See also
General
Advocacy
Lists

References

Notes
  1. ↑ "Rom". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 2010-09-15. According to Encyclopaedia Britannica, estimates of the total world Romani population range from two million to five million.
  2. ↑ "Online version". Retrieved 2010-09-15. Lewis, M. Paul (ed.), 2009. Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International. Ian Hancock's 1987 estimate for "all Gypsies in the world" was 6 to 11 million.
  3. ↑ "EU demands action to tackle Roma poverty". BBC News. 2011-04-05.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Webley, Kayla (October 13, 2010). "Hounded in Europe, Roma in the U.S. Keep a Low Profile". Time. Today, estimates put the number of Roma in the U.S. at about one million.
  5. ↑ The Special Secretariat for the Promotion of Racial Equality estimates the number of "ciganos" (Romanis) in Brazil at 800,000 (2011). The 2010 IBGE Brazilian National Census encountered gypsy camps in 291 of Brazil's 5,565 municipalities."Falta de políticas públicas para ciganos é desafio para o governo". R7. 2011. Retrieved 2012-01-22.
  6. ↑ "The Situation of Roma in Spain" (PDF). Open Society Institute. 2002. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-12-01. Retrieved 2010-09-15. The Spanish government estimates the number of Gitanos at a maximum of 650,000.
  7. ↑ "Rezultatele finale ale Recensământului din 2011 - Tab8. Populaţia stabilă după etnie – judeţe, municipii, oraşe, comune" (in Romanian). National Institute of Statistics (Romania). 5 July 2013. Retrieved 18 December 2013. However, various organizations claim that there are 2 million Romanis in Romania. See
  8. ↑ "Roma rights organizations work to ease prejudice in Turkey". EurasiaNet. 22 July 2005. Retrieved 2010-09-15. There are officially about 500,000 Roma in Turkey.
  9. ↑ "Situation of Roma in France at crisis proportions". EurActiv Network. 7 December 2005. Retrieved 2010-09-15. The Romani population in France is officially estimated at around 500,000.
  10. ↑ "Population By Districts And Ethnic Group As Of 01.03.2001". Retrieved 2010-09-15. Census 2001 in Bulgaria: 370,908 Roma
  11. ↑ "Population by national/ethnic groups". Hungarian Central Statistical Office. Retrieved 2010-09-15. Census 2001 in Hungary: 205,720 Roma/Bea
  12. ↑ "The Romani population in Greece is officially estimated at 200,000". Hellenic Republic National Commission For Human Rights. Retrieved 2010-09-15. Census 2001 in Hungary: 205,720 Roma/Bea
  13. ↑ Census 2001 in Slovakia
  14. ↑ "National Composition Of Population And Citizenship" (EXCEL). perepis2002.ru. Retrieved 2010-09-16. Census 2002 in Russia: 182,766 Roma.
  15. ↑ http://webrzs.stat.gov.rs/WebSite/userFiles/file/Aktuelnosti/Prezentacija_Knjiga1.pdf
  16. ↑ Demographics of Italy#Languages Estimated by Ministero degli Interni del Governo Italiano.
  17. ↑ Berlin-Institut für Bevölkerung und Entwicklung: Roma in Deutschland
  18. ↑ Ethnologue.com
  19. ↑ "The 2002-census reported 53,879 Roma and 3,843 'Egyptians'". Republic of Macedonia, State Statistical Office. Retrieved 2010-09-17.
  20. ↑ "Catemaco gypsies". Catemaco.info. Retrieved 2013-03-12.
  21. ↑ Sametingen. Information about minorities in Sweden (Swedish)
  22. ↑ State statistics committee of Ukraine - National composition of population, 2001 census (Ukrainian)
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 23.2 Gall, Timothy L. (ed). Worldmark Encyclopedia of Culture & Daily Life: Vol. 4 - Europe. Cleveland, OH: Eastword Publications Development (1998); pp. 316, 318 : "Religion: An underlay of Hinduism with an overlay of either Christianity or Islam (host country religion) "; "Roma religious beliefs are rooted in Hinduism. Roma believe in a universal balance, called kuntari... Despite a 1,000-year separation from India, Roma still practice 'shaktism', the worship of a god through his female consort... "
  24. ↑ Hancock, Ian F (2002). How Indian are Romanies, p. XX. ISBN 978-1-902806-19-8. Retrieved 2014-03-12. While a nine century' removal from India has diluted Indian biological connection to the extent that for some Romanian groups, it may be hardly representative today, Sarren (1976:72) concluded that, we still remain together, genetically, to Asian than European around us;
  25. ↑ Hancock, Ian F (2002). We Are the Romani People, p. XX. ISBN 978-1-902806-19-8. Retrieved 2008-07-31. There are Romanies everywhere, even in China or Singapore, but by far the greatest number live in Europe and in North and South America.
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 Kenrick, Donald (2007). Historical Dictionary of the Gypsies (Romanies) (2nd ed.). Scarecrow Press. p. xxxvii. The Gypsies, or Romanies, are an ethnic group that arrived in Europe around the 14th century. Scholars argue about when and how they left India, but it is generally accepted that they did emigrate from northern India some time between the 6th and 11th centuries, then crossed the Middle East and came into Europe.
  27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 Professor Yaron Matras (December 2012). "Domari". [romani] project. School of Languages, Linguistics and Cultures The University of Manchester. Retrieved 26 December 2012. The two were once thought to be ‘sister languages’ which split after leaving the Indian subcontinent, but more recent research suggests that the differences between them are much older. The Dom and the Rom are therefore more likely to be descendents of different migration waves, sharing primarily a caste-identity, but not necessarily a language. There are however some remarkable similarities between Romani and Domari, which appear to suggest a similar history.
  28. ↑ Corrêa Teixeira, Rodrigo. "A historia dos ciganos no Brasil" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on July 2011. Retrieved 2012-08-29.
  29. ↑ Sutherland, Ann, "Gypsies: The Hidden Americans", # Waveland Press (July 1986)# ISBN 0-88133-235-6, # ISBN 978-0-88133-235-3
  30. ↑ Yaron Matras (2002). Romani: A Linguistic Introduction. Cambridge University Press. p. 239. ISBN 978-0-521-63165-5. Retrieved 2009-07-16.
  31. ↑ "Romani" (PDF). Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Oxford: Elsevier. p. 1. Retrieved 2009-08-30. In some regions of Europe, especially the western margins (Britain, the Iberian peninsula, Scandinavia), Romani-speaking communities have given up their language in favor of the majority language, but have retained Romani-derived vocabulary as an in-group code. Such codes, for instance Angloromani (Britain), Caló (Spain), or Rommani (Scandinavia) are usually referred to as Para-Romani varieties.
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 32.2 32.3 Roma, Sinti, Gypsies, Travellers...The Correct Terminology about Roma at In Other WORDS project - Web Observatory & Review for Discrimination alerts & Stereotypes deconstruction
  33. ↑ Hancock, Ian F (2002). We Are the Romani People, p. XIX. ISBN 978-1-902806-19-8. Retrieved 2008-07-31.
  34. ↑ 34.0 34.1 Hancock, Ian F (2002). We Are the Romani People, p. XXI. ISBN 978-1-902806-19-8. Retrieved 2008-07-31.
  35. ↑ p. 52 in Elena Marushiakova and Vesselin Popov's "Historical and ethnographic background; gypsies, Roma, Sinti" in Will Guy [ed.] Between Past and Future: The Roma of Central and Eastern Europe [with a Foreword by Dr. Ian Hancock], 2001, UK: University of Hertfordshire Press.
  36. ↑ p. 13 in Illona Klimova-Alexander's The Romani Voice in World Politics: The United Nations and Non-State Actors (2005, Burlington, VT.: Ashgate).
  37. ↑ Xavier Rothéa. "Les Roms, une nation sans territoire?" (in French). Retrieved 2008-07-31.
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 Bryan A. Garner (2011). Garner's Dictionary of Legal Usage. Oxford University Press. pp. 400–. ISBN 978-0-19-538420-8.
  39. ↑ 39.0 39.1 Guido Bolaffi (2003). Dictionary of Race, Ethnicity and Culture. SAGE Publications. pp. 291–. ISBN 978-0-7619-6900-6.
  40. ↑ O'Nions, Helen (2007). Minority rights protection in international law: the Roma of Europe. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. p. 6. ISBN 9781409490920.
  41. ↑ Hancock, Ian F (2002). We Are the Romani People, p. XX. ISBN 978-1-902806-19-8. Retrieved 2008-07-31.
  42. ↑ "Dom: The Gypsy community in Jerusalem". The Institute for Middle East Understanding. February 13, 2007. Retrieved 2010-09-17.
  43. ↑ Douglas Harper (February 13, 2007). "Etymology of Romani". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 2010-09-17.
  44. ↑ Soulis, G. (1961). The Gypsies in the Byzantine Empire and the Balkans in the Late Middle Ages. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Trustees for Harvard University, 15, 141-165.
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 White, Karin (1999). "Metal-workers, agriculturists, acrobats, military-people and fortune-tellers: Roma (Gypsies) in and around the Byzantine empire". Golden Horn 7 (2). Retrieved 2007-08-26.
  46. ↑ Fraser 1992.
  47. ↑ Hancock, Ian (1995). A Handbook of Vlax Romani. Slavica Publishers. p. 17.
  48. ↑ Terry Victor; Tom Dalzell (1 December 2007). The Concise New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English. Routledge. pp. 314–. ISBN 978-1-134-61534-6.
  49. ↑ Merriam-Webster's pocket guide to English usage. Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster. 1998. p. 178. ISBN 0877795142.
  50. ↑ Bryan Garner (28 July 2009). Garner's Modern American Usage. Oxford University Press. pp. 1740–. ISBN 978-0-19-987462-0.
  51. ↑ Baskin, [by] H.E. Wedeck with the assistance of Wade. Dictionary of gypsy life and lore. New York: Philosophical Library. ISBN 0806529857.
  52. ↑ Report in Roma Educational Needs in Ireland
  53. ↑ American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, definition 1 and 2
  54. ↑ American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, definition 3 and 4
  55. ↑ Starr, J. (1936). An Eastern Christian Sect: the Athinganoi. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Trustees for Harvard University, 29, 93-106.
  56. ↑ Bates, Karina. "A Brief History of the Rom". Archived from the original on 2007-08-10. Retrieved 2007-08-26.
  57. ↑ "Book Reviews" (PDF). Population Studies 48 (2): 365–372. July 1994. doi:10.1080/0032472031000147856.
  58. ↑ "gitan" (in French). Dictionnaire de l'Académie française. Retrieved 2007-08-26. Nom donné aux bohémiens d'Espagne ; par ext., synonyme de Bohémien, Tzigane. Adjt. Une robe gitane.
  59. ↑ 3.8 million according to Pan and Pfeil, National Minorities in Europe (2004), ISBN 978-3-7003-1443-1, p. 27f.
  60. ↑ Council of Europe compilation of population estimates
  61. ↑ Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. The endless and countless number of designations which were and still are given to individual groups of Roma during the course of their extra-Indian history is a result of the Indian archetype of caste (kinship-professional) reproduction and, in addition, the movement of the Roma to different political and ethno-linguistic milieus of Asia, Europe, America and Australia.
  62. ↑ Horvátová, Jana (2002). Kapitoly z dějin Romů [Chapters from Romani history] (PDF) (in Czech). Praha: Lidové noviny. p. 12. Mnohočetnost romských skupin je patrně pozůstatkem diferenciace Romů do původních indických kast a podkast. / The multitude of Roma groups is apparently a relic of Roma differentiation to Indian castes and subcastes.
  63. ↑ Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. A basic, probably the most original and in its way all-inclusive autonymum is the ethnic name (ethnonymum) Rom.
  64. ↑ Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. Although today, Roma living in various lands around the world use different "autonyma" for their societies (Sinti, Kale, Manouche, etc.), all acknowledge a common origin and basic identity with Roma. This is mainly so with reference to the Rom-Gadžo (non-Rom) dichotomy.
  65. ↑ 65.0 65.1 65.2 65.3 65.4 Jurová, Anna (2003). Vaščka, Michal; Jurásková, Martina; Nicholson, Tom, eds. "From Leaving The Homeland to the First Assimilation Measures" (PDF). ČAČIPEN PAL O ROMA - A Global Report on Roma in Slovakia (Slovak Republic: Institute for Public Affairs): 17. Retrieved September 7, 2013. the Sinti lived in German territory, the Manusha in France, the Romanitsel in England, the Kale in Spain and Portugal, and the Kaale in Finland.
  66. ↑ Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. Kale is an autonymous term used by Roma in Finland.
  67. ↑ 67.0 67.1 Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. Spanish and Finnish Cale / Kale probably have nothing in common; their identical autonymum is a coincidence.
  68. ↑ 68.0 68.1 Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. The name Cale (pronounced something like "Calley") in itself designates the Roma of Spain. (...) this term, which means "black" (...)
  69. ↑ Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. The Spanish Cale use the term Cale for their language. The Cale language is para-Romani
  70. ↑ "The Legend of the Romani Cymreig / Welsh Romani". Romani Cymru - Romany Wales Project. ValleyStream Media. 1980–2010. The Kale, who became the Welsh Gypsies, probably came from Spain, through France and landed in Cornwall, eventually making their way to Wales.
  71. ↑ 71.0 71.1 71.2 Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. A sub-group of Sinti are the Manouche. They live mainly in France. The etymology of the name Manouche is Indian. The term manouche means a human being (in Sanskrit, in neo-Indian languages and in Romani).
  72. ↑ Jurová, Anna (2003). Vaščka, Michal; Jurásková, Martina; Nicholson, Tom, eds. "From Leaving The Homeland to the First Assimilation Measures" (PDF). ČAČIPEN PAL O ROMA - A Global Report on Roma in Slovakia (Slovak Republic: Institute for Public Affairs): 17. Retrieved September 7, 2013. The word "manush" is also included in all dialects of Romany. It means man, while "Manusha" equals people. This word has the same form and meaning in Sanskrit as well, and is almost identical in other Indian languages.
  73. ↑ 73.0 73.1 Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. The autonymum Sinti (pl.) (Sinto, m. sing.; Sintica, f. sing.) is used by members of an important Roma society, the greatest number of whom live in Germany. Hence, one of the exonymous terms for Sinti is "German Gypsies / Roma". Although the Sinti do not speak of themselves as Roma, they say they speak romanes.
  74. ↑ Teaching Tolerance. "Romani Diversity | Teaching Tolerance". Tolerance.org. Retrieved 2013-12-10.
  75. ↑ Dicţionarul etimologic român (The Etymological Dictionary of the Romanian language), quoted in DEX-online (see lemma rudár, rudári, s.m. followed by both definitions: gold miner" and "wood crafter")
  76. ↑ "Vlax Romani: Churari (Speech variety #16036)". Globalrecordings.net. Retrieved 2013-12-10.
  77. ↑ "Romani language and alphabet". Omniglot.com. Retrieved 2013-12-10.
  78. ↑ 78.0 78.1 78.2 78.3 78.4 Milena, Hübshmanová (2003). "Roma – Sub Ethnic Groups". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz.
  79. ↑ "Culture". Middleeastgypsies.com. Retrieved 2013-12-10.
  80. ↑ New Ethnic Identities in the Balkans: The Case of the Egyptians
  81. ↑ 81.0 81.1 81.2 81.3 Isabel Mendizabal and 21 others, "Reconstructing the Population History of European Romani from Genome-wide Data", Current Biology, Available online 6 December 2012, accessed 12 December 2012
  82. ↑ 82.0 82.1 82.2 82.3 82.4 "Genomic Study Traces Roma to Northern India", New York Times, 11 December 2012. Findings recently reported also in Current Biology.
  83. ↑ Milena Hübschmannová (2002). "Origin of Roma". ROMBASE. Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. Retrieved 3 September 2013.
  84. ↑ Yaron Matras (2002). Romani: a linguistic introduction. Cambridge University Press. p. 14. ISBN 978-0-521-63165-5. Retrieved 2009-07-16. There is no known record of a migration from India to Europe in medieval times that can be connected indisputably with the ancestors of today’s Romani-speaking population.
  85. ↑ Digard, Jean-Pierre. "GYPSY i. Gypies of Persia". Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved 2013-07-22.
  86. ↑ Šebková, Hana; Žlnayová, Edita (1998). Nástin mluvnice slovenské romštiny (pro pedagogické účely). Ústí nad Labem: Pedagogická fakulta Univerzity J. E. Purkyně v Ústí nad Labem: p. 4. ISBN 80-7044-205-0.
  87. ↑ Hübschmannová, Milena (1995). "Romaňi čhib – romština: Několik základních informací o romském jazyku". Bulletin Muzea romské kultury (Brno: Muzeum romské kultury) (4/1995). Zatímco romská lexika je bližší hindštině, marvárštině, pandžábštině atd., v gramatické sféře nacházíme mnoho shod s východoindickým jazykem, s bengálštinou.
  88. ↑ Matras, Yaron (2002). Romani: A Linguistic Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-02330-0
  89. ↑ Matras, Yaron (2006). "Domari" (PDF). In Keith Brown. Encyclopedia of Languages and Linguistics (Second ed.). Oxford: Elsevier. The morphology of the two languages is similar in other respects: Both retain the old present conjugation in the verb (Domari kar-ami ‘I do’), and consonantal endings of the oblique nominal case (Domari mans-as ‘man.OBL’, mans-an ‘men.OBL’), and both show agglutination of secondary (Layer II) case endings (Domari mans-as-ka ‘for the man’). It had therefore been assumed that Romani and Domari derived form the same ancestor idiom, and split only after leaving the Indian subcontinent.
  90. ↑ "On romani origins and identity". Retrieved 2008-07-23
  91. ↑ after Ian Hancock, On Romani Origins and Identity, RADOC (2007)
  92. ↑ http://www.livescience.com/40652-facts-about-roma-romani-gypsies.html
  93. ↑ Rai N, Chaubey G, Tamang R, Pathak AK, Singh VK, et al. (2012) "The Phylogeography of Y-Chromosome Haplogroup H1a1a-M82 Reveals the Likely Indian Origin of the European Romani Populations", PLoS ONE 7(11): e48477. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0048477
  94. ↑ Authors = Luba Kalaydjieva, Francesc Calafell, Mark A Jobling, Dora Angelicheva, Peter de Knijff,Zoe H Rosser, Matthew Hurles, Peter Underhill, Ivailo Tournev, Elena Marushiakova, Vesselin Popov. Title = Patterns of inter- and intra-group genetic diversity in the Vlax Roma as revealed by Y chromosome and mitochondrial DNA lineages Journal = European Journal Of Human Genetics http://genetics.stanford.edu/hpgl/publications/EJHG_2001_v9_p97.pdf
  95. ↑ 95.0 95.1 Luba Kalaydjieva; Gresham, David; Calafell, Francesc (2001). "Genetic studies of the Roma (Gypsies): A review". BMC Medical Genetics 2: 5. doi:10.1186/1471-2350-2-5. PMC 31389. PMID 11299048. Retrieved 2008-06-16.
  96. ↑ "Figure 4". Biomedcentral.com. doi:10.1186/1471-2350-2-5. Retrieved 2009-05-06.
  97. ↑ 97.0 97.1 Gresham, D; Morar, B; Underhill, PA; Passarino, G; Lin, AA; Wise, C; Angelicheva, D; Calafell, F; Oefner, PJ; Shen, Peidong; Tournev, Ivailo; De Pablo, Rosario; Kuĉinskas, Vaidutis; Perez-Lezaun, Anna; Marushiakova, Elena; Popov, Vesselin; Kalaydjieva, Luba (2001). "Origins and Divergence of the Roma (Gypsies)". American Journal of Human Genetics 69 (6): 1314–31. doi:10.1086/324681. PMC 1235543. PMID 11704928.
  98. ↑ "Mutation history of the Roma-Gypsies". Retrieved 2008-06-16.
  99. ↑ McDougall, Dan (17 Aug 2008). "'Why do the Italians hate us?'". The Guardian. Retrieved 2013-05-10.
  100. ↑ Ian F. Hancock, Siobhan Dowd, Rajko Djurić (2004). The Roads of the Roma: a PEN anthology of Gypsy Writers. Hatfield, United Kingdom: University of Hertfordshire Press. pp. 14–15. ISBN 0-900458-90-9.
  101. ↑ "Romani" (PDF). Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Oxford: Elsevier. Retrieved 2009-08-30.
  102. ↑ Mendizabal et. al (2012) "Our results further indicate that after a rapid migration with moderate gene flow from the Near or Middle East, the European spread of the Romani people was via the Balkans starting ∼0.9 kya."
  103. ↑ Anfuso, Linda (1994-02-24). "gypsies". Newsgroup: rec.org.sca. Usenet: PaN9Hc2w165w@tinhat.stonemarche.org. Retrieved December 5, 2014.
  104. ↑ Bright Balkan morning: Romani lives & the power of music in Greek Macedonia, Charles Keil et al, 2002, p.108
  105. ↑ The Gypsies, Angus M. Fraser, 1995, pp.50-51
  106. ↑ 106.0 106.1 106.2 106.3 Donald Kenrick, "Historical Dictionary of the Gypsies (Romanies)," Second Edition, Scarecrow Press, 2007.
  107. ↑ Norman Davies (1996). Europe: A History. pp. 387–388. ISBN 0-19-820171-0.
  108. ↑ Hancock, Ian, 2001, Ame sam e rromane džene (We are the Romani People), New York: The Open Society Institute, p. 25
  109. ↑ Delia Radu, "'On the Road': Centuries of Roma History", BBC World Service, 8 July 2009
  110. ↑ Romanies and the Holocaust: A Reevaluation and an Overview
  111. ↑ "United States Holocaust Memorial Museum". Retrieved 2012-12-02.
  112. ↑ Hancock, Ian (2005). "True Romanies and the Holocaust: A Re-evaluation and an overview". The Historiography of the Holocaust. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 383–396. ISBN 1-4039-9927-9
  113. ↑ Denysenko, Marina (2007-03-12). "Sterilised Roma accuse Czechs". BBC News.
  114. ↑ Thomas, Jeffrey (2006-08-16). "Coercive Sterilization of Romani Women Examined at Hearing: New report focuses on Czech Republic and Slovakia". Washington File. Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State.
  115. ↑ "Romani Customs and Traditions: Death Rituals and Customs". Patrin Web Journal. Archived from the original on 2007-08-21. Retrieved 2007-08-26.
  116. ↑ David M. Knipe. "The Journey of a Lifebody". Retrieved 2008-05-26.
  117. ↑ Hancock, Ian, 2001, Ame sam e rromane džene / We are the Romani People, The Open Society Institute, New York, page 81
  118. ↑ Saul, Nicholas; Susan Tebbut (2005). Nicholas Saul, Susan Tebbutt, ed. The role of the Romanies: images and counter-images of 'Gypsies'/Romanies in European cultures. Liverpool University Press. p. 218. ISBN 978-0-85323-689-4. Retrieved March 0310. Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  119. ↑ "Restless Beings Project: Roma Engage". restlessbeings. Restless Beings. 2008–2012. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  120. ↑ Boretzky, Norbert (1995). Romani in Contact: The History, Structure and Sociology of a Language. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: John Benjamins Publishing Company. p. 70.
  121. ↑ "Blessed Ceferino Gime nez Malla 1861-1936". Saviour.org – Visit the Saviour. Voveo Marketing Group. December 2012. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  122. ↑ 122.0 122.1 Ronald Lee (2002). "THE ROMANI GODDESS KALI SARA". Romano Kapachi. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  123. ↑ http://www.radoc.net/radoc.php?doc=art_b_history_romanireligion&lang=en&articles=true
  124. ↑ 124.0 124.1 124.2 "Roma". Countries and their Cultures. Advameg, Inc. 2012. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  125. ↑ Joshua Project. "Romani, Vlax, Southern in Albania Ethnic People Profile". Joshuaproject.net. Retrieved 2013-12-10.
  126. ↑ 126.0 126.1 126.2 126.3 126.4 126.5 126.6 126.7 Elena Marushiakova; Veselin Popov (2012). "Home - Culture - Roma Muslims in the Balkans". Education of Roma Children in Europe. Council of Europe. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  127. ↑ Census 2002, by religion at insse.ro
  128. ↑ Flamenco: All You Wanted to Know - Page 21, Google books.
  129. ↑ Rootsworld artilcle: Cümbüş means fun, Birger Gesthuisen investigates the short history of a 20th-century folk instrument.
  130. ↑ The American Ethnic Cookbook for Students - Page 132, Google Books.
  131. ↑ Memories of a Gypsy, Google Books
  132. ↑ Comparative-Historical Linguistics: Indo-European and Finno-Ugric
  133. ↑ Raymond G. Gordon Jr., ed. (2005). "Caló: A language of Spain". Ethnologue: Languages of the World (15th ed.). Dallas, Texas: SIL International. ISBN 978-1-55671-159-6.
  134. ↑ Matras, Yaron. "Romani Linguistics and Romani Language Projects". http://romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk''. The University of Manchester. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  135. ↑ Matras, Yaron. "Romani Linguistics and Romani Language Projects". http://romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/''. The University of Manchester. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  136. ↑ Matras, Yaron. "Romani Linguistics and Romani Language Projects". http://romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk''. The University of Manchester. Retrieved 24 February 2015.
  137. ↑ 137.0 137.1 Matras, Yaron (October 2005). "The status of Romani in Europe" (PDF). Report submitted to the Council of Europe’s Language Policy Division: 4. Retrieved 4 March 2015.
  138. ↑ 138.0 138.1 138.2 Viorel Achim, The Roma in Romanian History, Central European University Press, Budapest, 2004, ISBN 963-9241-84-9
  139. ↑ Delia Grigore, Petre Petcuţ and Mariana Sandu (2005). Istoria şi tradiţiile minorităţii rromani (in Romanian). Bucharest: Sigma. p. 36.
  140. ↑ Ştefan Ştefănescu, Istoria medie a României, Vol. I, Editura Universităţii din Bucureşti, Bucharest, 1991 (Romanian)
  141. ↑ 141.0 141.1 "Timeline of Romani History". Patrin Web Journal. Archived from the original on 2007-11-11. Retrieved 2007-08-26.
  142. ↑ Most estimates for numbers of Romani victims of the Holocaust fall between 200,000 and 500,000, although figures ranging between 90,000 and 4 million have been proposed. Lower estimates do not include those killed in all Axis-controlled countries. A detailed study by Sybil Milton, formerly senior historian at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum gave a figure of at least a minimum of 220,000, probably higher, possibly closer to 500,000 (cited in Re. Holocaust Victim Assets Litigation (Swiss Banks) Special Master's Proposals, September 11, 2000). Ian Hancock, Director of the Program of Romani Studies and the Romani Archives and Documentation Center at the University of Texas at Austin, argues in favour of a higher figure of between 500,000 and 1,500,000 in his 2004 article, Romanies and the Holocaust: A Reevaluation and an Overview as published in Stone, D. (ed.) (2004) The Historiography of the Holocaust. Palgrave, Basingstoke and New York.
  143. ↑ 143.0 143.1 Samer, Helmut (December 2001). "Maria Theresia and Joseph II: Policies of Assimilation in the Age of Enlightened Absolutism". Rombase. Karl-Franzens-Universitaet Graz.
  144. ↑ "Gitanos. History and Cultural Relations". World Culture Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2007-08-26.
  145. ↑ Kenrick, Donald. "Roma in Norway". Patrin Web Journal. Retrieved 2012-03-13.
  146. ↑ "The Church of Norway and the Roma of Norway". World Council of Churches. 2002-09-03.
  147. ↑ "Roma on the rubbish dump". CIA World Factbook. Retrieved 2014-02-21.
  148. ↑ http://www.osce.org/odihr/39623?download=true
  149. ↑ "Council of Europe website" at the Wayback Machine (archived February 21, 2009). European Roma and Travellers Forum (ERTF). 2007. Archived from the original on 2007-07-06.
  150. ↑ "Demolita la "bidonville" di Ponte Mammolo". il Giornale. 2007-12-05. Retrieved 2013-05-10.
  151. ↑ "Fini: impossibile integrarsi con chi ruba". Corriere della Sera. 4 Nov 2007. Retrieved 2013-05-10.
  152. ↑ "European effort spotlights plight of the Roma". USA Today. 2005-02-01. Retrieved 2013-05-10.
  153. ↑ "Europe must break cycle of discrimination facing Roma". Amnesty International. 7 April 2010. Retrieved 15 September 2010.
  154. ↑ "Amnesty International". Web.amnesty.org. 2009-04-20. Retrieved 2009-05-06.
  155. ↑ Colin Woodard (2008-02-13). "Hungary's anti-Roma militia grows". Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 2010-09-15.
  156. ↑ "roma | Human Rights Press Point". Humanrightspoint.si. Retrieved 2009-05-06.
  157. ↑ "Roma and Ashkali in Kosovo: Persecuted, driven out, poisoned". Gfbv.de. Retrieved 2009-05-06.
  158. ↑ "National Roma Integration Strategies: a first step in the implementation of the EU Framework" (PDF). European Commission. Retrieved 3 May 2014.
  159. ↑ Claude Cahn (2007). "Birth of a Nation: Kosovo and the Persecution of Pariah Minorities" (PDF). German Law Journal 8 (1). ISSN 2071-8322.
  160. ↑ Sterilised Roma accuse Czechs, BBC, 12 March 2007
  161. ↑ For Gypsies, Eugenics is a Modern Problem - Czech Practice Dates to Soviet Era, Newsdesk, June 12, 2006
  162. ↑ "Final Statement of the Public Defender of Rights in the Matter of Sterilisations Performed in Contravention of the Law and Proposed Remedial Measures". The Office of The Public Defender of Rights. December 23, 2005. Archived from the original on 2007-11-28. Retrieved 2010-09-15.
  163. ↑ Hooper, John (November 2, 2007). "Italian woman's murder prompts expulsion threat to Romanians". The Guardian (London).
  164. ↑ de Zulueta, Tana (2009-03-30). "Italy's new ghetto?". The Guardian (London).
  165. ↑ Bagnall, Sam (2 September 2009). "How Gypsy gangs use child thieves". BBC News.
  166. ↑ Hellen Kooijman (6 April 2012). "Bleak horizon". Presseurop. Retrieved 6 April 2012.
  167. ↑ "France sends Roma Gypsies back to Romania". BBC. August 20, 2010. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
  168. ↑ "Troops patrol French village of Saint-Aignan after riot". BBC. July 19, 2010. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
  169. ↑ "Q&A: France Roma expulsions". BBC. September 15, 2010. Retrieved 2010-09-16.
  170. ↑ "France Begins Controversial Roma Deportations". Der Spiegel. 2010-08-19. Retrieved 2010-08-20.
  171. ↑ "EU may take legal action against France over Roma". BBC News. 14 September 2010. Retrieved 15 September 2010.
Bibliography

(An extensive historical bibliography, "Gypsies in France, 1566–2011", is available at .)

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Roma people.
European countries Roma links
The concentration, Labor, Ghetto camps that the Roma were persecuted in during World War II
Non-governmental organisations
Museums and libraries