Romani people

The wandering of the so-called Gypsies, or Romani, of North India begins at approximately this time.

The absence of a written history has meant that the origin and early history of the Romani people was long an enigma.

Linguistic evidence indicates the Romanies originated from the Rajasthani people, emigrating from India towards the northwest no earlier than the eleventh century.

Contemporary populations sometimes suggested as sharing a close relationship to the Romani are the Dom people of Central Asia and the Banjara of India.

Genetic evidence connects the Romani people and the Jat people, the descendants of groups that emigrated from India towards Central Asia during the medieval period.

There are serological similarities shared with several populations that linked the two people in a 1992 study.

A limited medical survey of haplotypes frequently found in the Jat Sikhs and Jats of Haryana, and those found in the Romani populations revealed no matches in 2007.

However, in 2009 researchers discovered the "Jat mutation", which causes a type of glaucoma in Romani people.

The cause of the Romani diaspora is unknown.

However, the most probable conclusion is that the Romanies were part of the military in North India.

When there were repeated raids by Mahmud of Ghazni and these soldiers were defeated, they were moved west with their families into the Eastern Roman Empire.

The likely ancestral populations of modern European Roma are a group labeled by modern geneticists as the Doma, who had left northwestern India about CE 500, reaching the Balkans at the beginning of the twelfth century.

The Roma, genetically similar to other Europeans despite some isolation, will spread throughout Europe.

The Tarot, a deck of seventy-eight playing cards of obscure origin, initially brought from the East to Italy in the early fourteenth century by emigrating Rom (Gypsies) or by returning Crusaders, first appears in Germany in 1329.

The Arrival of the Rom in Europe (14th Century)

The Rom, a landless, wandering people of north-central Indian origin, entered Europe in the 14th century, bringing with them a distinct language (Romany) and a unique cultural identity. Their language, Romany, retains a Sanskrit-based structure with loanwords from various lands they passed through, reflecting their long migratory history.

Origins and Migration

Modern scholarship suggests that the Rom may have originated from a multiethnic military group formed in northwestern India to resist Islamic invasions. Over time, they migrated westward, likely moving through Persia, Armenia, and the Byzantine Empire before reaching the Balkans and Western Europe.

Economic and Social Exclusion

Upon their arrival in Europe, the Rom found themselves marginalized by local societies.

• They rejected agriculture and other settled occupations, instead specializing in trades that avoided direct competition with local populations.
• Excluded from craft and trade guilds, they earned their livelihood as:
  • Entertainers and musicians
  • Magicians and fortune tellers
  • Blacksmiths and coppersmiths
  • Horse traders and animal handlers

Religious and Social Stigma

The Roman Catholic Church forbade association with Rom fortunetellers, reinforcing their status as outsiders.

• Their mystical reputation, nomadic lifestyle, and distinct customs fueled mistrust and discrimination.
• In England, they were erroneously believed to have come from Egypt, leading to the colloquial term "Gypsies", which would become widespread.

Long-Term Influence and Legacy

Despite centuries of marginalization and persecution, the Rom contributed to European culture, particularly in music, metalworking, and horse trading. Their oral traditions and artistic expressions shaped aspects of folk music and performance arts in various countries.

Their 14th-century arrival in Europe marked the beginning of a complex and often fraught relationship with European societies, one that continues to evolve today.

The island of Corfu, eclipsed in 31 BCE by the foundation of Nicopolis in Epirus by the future Emperor Augustus, had for a long time passed out of notice.

With the rise of the Norman kingdom in Sicily and the Italian naval powers, it had again became a frequent object of attack.

It was held in 1081–1085 by Robert Guiscard and in 1147–1154 by Roger II of Sicily.

During the breakup of Constantinople’s Empire at the turn of the thirteenth century, the island was occupied by Genoese privateers (1197–1207), who in turn were expelled by the Venetians.

It had passed in 1214 to the Greek despots of Epirus, who gave it to Manfred of Sicily as a dowry in 1259.

It passed at his death in 1267 with his other possessions to the house of Anjou.

Under the latter, the island has suffered considerably from the inroads of various adventurers.

The island is one of the first places in Europe in which Romani people ("Gypsies") settle.

A fiefdom, called the Feudum Acinganorum, had been established in about 1360, with mainly Romani serfs.

Corfu on February 13, 1386, becomes once more a Venetian possession and this time Venetian rule will last until the end of the Republic.

This is accomplished voluntary by the people of Corfu.

The Corfiotes on May 10 appoint five ambassadors to submit to the Venetian senate.

The Romani, although they are refugees from the conflicts in southeastern Europe, are 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 had declared that the Romani were spies of the Turks).

In Western Europe, such suspicions and discrimination against a people who were a visible minority results in persecution, often violent, with efforts to achieve ethnic cleansing until the modern era.

In times of social tension, the Romani suffer as scapegoats; for instance, they are accused of bringing the plague during times of epidemics.

Spanish legislation in 1499 orders Gypsies to find a trade and master and cease traveling together, within sixty days, on pain of one hundred lashes and banishment.

The punishment for repeat offenders is amputation of ears, sixty days in chains, and banishment.

Third-time offenders are to become enslaved by those who capture them.

The Augsburg Reichstag of 1500, at the request of Maximilian I, declares Roma traitors to the Christian countries, and accuses them of witchcraft, kidnapping of children, and banditry.

England enacts laws in 1530 that give Gypsies to choice of acquiring a trade or being expelled.

The Ottoman Empire is a world power when Suleyman dies in 1566.

Most of the great cities of Islam—Mecca, Medina, Jerusalem, Damascus, Cairo, Tunis, and Baghdad— are under the sultan's crescent flag.

The Porte exercises direct control over Anatolia, the sub-Danubian Balkan provinces, Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia.

Egypt, Mecca, and the North African provinces are governed under special regulations, as are satellite domains in Arabia and the Caucasus, and among the Crimean Tartars.

In addition, the native rulers of Wallachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, and Ragusa (Dubrovnik) are vassals of the sultan.

Moldavia’s Prince Mihail Sturdza decrees the emancipation of the Gypsies in 1844.

Until now, the Gypsies had been treated as slaves and owned by the Church or by private landowners; they had been bought and sold in the open market.