Archaeology of the Romani people refers to the science of archaeology as applied in relation to the Romani people, an ethnic group dispersed across the world, which is known under several different names. The Romani people has a long history, and most likely hails from the Indian subcontinent. Throughout said history, the highly diverse Roma population has faced significant persecution in many parts of the world, and continues to do so today.
Due to the Romani people's frequent status as outsiders in regards to mainstream society and a constant minority, lacking any form of nation state and in turn facing structural bias and neglect from many national, regional and local governments and authorities, the research done into Romani history and culture has often been either lacking or non-existent. In modern times, even when this issue gradually being resolved in some areas, the field of Romani archaeology remains virtually unexplored. For example, the prominent Hungarian archaeologist Eszter Bánffy (de), director of the Römisch-Germanische Kommission of the German Archaeological Institute, has written that in all of post-Cold War era Eastern Europe, she has not found a single archaeologist of Romani heritage, nor anyone interested in researching let alone excavating possible Romani archaeological sites. [1]
While the French sociologist Jean-Pierre Liégeois (fr), director of the Gypsy Research Centre, has asserted that due to their often highly mobile lifestyle and frequent societal discrimination, the Romani have left behind no such archaeological sites, [2] there have been some limited field surveys and excavations of Romani-related sites.
John-Henry Phillips, a British archaeologist from a Romany background, and co-presenter of Channel 4's The Great British Dig, formed Romani Community Archaeology in 2022, and has undertaken excavations of historic Romany Gypsy sites in the United Kingdom [3] [4] .
This is especially the case in Sweden and Norway, where the Norwegian and Swedish Travellers arrived in the early 16th century. Two sites in particular have gone through several stages of excavation, with a third excavation project beginning in 2015. One is Snarsmon (also pejoratively called Tattarstaden, roughly the Gypsy Town), a Romani village close to the Norwegian border in Tanum Municipality which was active as a sanctuary from the 1860s until the first years of the 20th century. Surveys began in 2003, with yearly excavations between 2004 and 2007. Done in the style of community archaeology, participants – other than professional archaeologists – included both local inhabitants of non-Romani origin, as well as members from several Traveller organizations and one Roma cultural association. [5] One result of this project was the establishment in 2012 of the first Swedish museum exhibition about Traveller history, located in the town of Uddevalla, featuring some of the objects found during the excavations. [6] [7]
The second Swedish site is Krämarstaden (roughly translated, the Huckster Town), likewise a Romani village, located near Finnerödja in Laxå Municipality. The village was established in the first years of the 20th century, and abandoned in the beginning of the 1920s. Core surveys began at the same time as those in Snarsmon, with two phases of archaeological excavation taking place in 2013 and 2014, which much like the previous project involved professional archaeologists and other scientists, local inhabitants, and Swedish Travellers. [8] [9]
In August 2015, excavations began at a Romani campsite outside of Stockholm, in Skarpnäck. The camp was built in 1959 by the Swedish state as a temporary solution, until apartments could be arranged for the Romani, who had just been given full civic rights (and with that, a right to housing). The camp soon became permanent as the administrative process was dragged out, its inhabitants – about thirty people – living in tents, caravans and two home-built cottages, exposed to the weather. The two-year project, titled I stadens utkant (In the City's Fringe), is financed partially by the Swedish National Heritage Board, and is a cooperative project between the Swedish History Museum, the cultural association É Romani Glinda (the Romani Mirror), Mångkulturellt Centrum (Multicultural Center) in Botkyrka, and Stiftelsen Kulturmiljövård (the Cultural Environment Management Foundation). It will result in a book and an excavation report, in addition to certain finds forming part of the "Sweden's History" exhibition at the Swedish History Museum. [10] [11]
Several other archaeological sites belonging to the Romani people and the Scandinavian Travellers exist in Sweden as well as Norway, some of which were surveyed and mapped out in the transnational Scandinavian Traveller Map project. One of these, Tattardalen (Gypsy Valley) in Kungälv Municipality, is a ruined farmstead dating back to the 1600s, and is therefore the oldest Scandinavian site connected to the Travellers. [12]
Since 2017 archaeological surveys have taken place at the site of a Roma concentration camp in the Czech Republic. After World War II the site located at Lety u Písku was converted to a pig farm. Recently the farm has been shut down and work is underway to convert the complex into a museum. Archaeological excavations at the site have recovered building materials such as nails and door handles as well as beads and buttons that may have belonged to the prisoners there. Upcoming excavations will seek to locate the camp's burial sites. [13]
John-Henry Phillips, a British archaeologist from a Romany background, and co-presenter of Channel 4's The Great British Dig, formed Romani Community Archaeology in 2022, and has undertaken excavations of historic Romany Gypsy sites in the United Kingdom. [3] [4] The first of these investigated the site of a former 'Gypsy Rehabiliation Centre' at Thorney Hill in the New Forest - a site of forced assimilation - that ran from the 1960s - 1970s [14] . The excavation was undertaken as a community archaeology project, and was featured on Series 12 of BBC Two' s Digging For Britain with Alice Roberts [15] .
Another example of possibly Romani-related archaeology is a June 2010 excavation of the "Caird’s Cave" in Rosemarkie, Scotland, a site possibly inhabited by Scottish Gypsy and Traveller groups. [16] In addition to archaeology directly relating to Romani sites, there have also been some research done into the archaeogenetics and "linguistic archaeology" [17] of the Romani people. An example of this is the discovery of a skeleton in an Anglo-Saxon cemetery under Norwich Castle in Norfolk, which – as reported by British Archaeology – was genetically identified as a possible Romani man. [18]
The Romani people, also known as the Roma, are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group who traditionally lived a nomadic, itinerant lifestyle. Linguistic and genetic evidence suggests that the Romani people originated in the Indian subcontinent, in particular the region of Rajasthan. Their first wave of westward migration is believed to have occurred sometime between the 5th and 11th centuries. They are thought to have first arrived in Europe sometime between the 9th and 14th centuries. Although they are widely dispersed, their most concentrated populations are believed to be in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Serbia and Slovakia.
The Romani Holocaust was the genocide of European Roma and Sinti people during World War II. Beginning in 1933, Nazi Germany systematically persecuted the European Roma, Sinti and other peoples pejoratively labeled 'Gypsy' through forcible internment and compulsory sterilization. German authorities summarily and arbitrarily subjected Romani people to incarceration, forced labor, deportation and mass murder in concentration and extermination camps.
The Romani people have long been a part of the collective mythology of the West, where they were depicted as outsiders, aliens, and a threat. For centuries they were enslaved in Eastern Europe and hunted in Western Europe: the Pořajmos, Hitler's attempt at genocide, was one violent link in a chain of persecution that encompassed countries generally considered more tolerant of minorities, such as the United Kingdom. Even today, while there is a surge of Romani self-identification and pride, restrictive measures are being debated and passed by democratic states to curb the rights of the Romani people.
The Romanichal are a Romani subgroup within the United Kingdom and other parts of the English-speaking world. Many Romanichal speak Angloromani, a mixed language that blends Romani vocabulary with English syntax. Romanichal residing in England, Scotland, and Wales are part of the Gypsy (Romani), Roma, and Traveller community.
The Romani people, also referred to as the Roma, are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group that primarily lives in Europe. The Romani may have migrated from what is the modern Indian state of Rajasthan, migrating to the northwest around 250 BC. Their subsequent westward migration out of India is believed to have occurred in waves, beginning in the 5th century. It has been suggested that a wave of emigration from India may have taken place during the raids by Mahmud of Ghazni. As these soldiers were defeated, they were moved west with their families into the Byzantine Empire.
Romani culture encompasses the regional cultures of the Romani people, an Indo-Aryan ethnic group originating in northwest India. These cultures have developed through complex histories of interaction with their surrounding populations.
The Romani flag or the flag of the Roma is the international ethnic flag of the Romani people, historically known as "Gypsies", which form a stateless minority in countries across Eurasia, Africa, the Americas, and Australasia. It was approved by the representatives of various Romani communities at the first and second World Romani Congresses (WRC), in 1971 and 1978. The flag consists of a background of blue and green, representing the heavens and earth, respectively; it also contains a 16-spoke red dharmachakra, or cartwheel, in the center. The latter element stands for the itinerant tradition of the Romani people and is also an homage to the flag of India, added to the flag by scholar Weer Rajendra Rishi. It superseded a number of tribal emblems and banners, several of which evoked claims of Romani descent from the Ancient Egyptians.
Anti-Romani sentiment is an ideology which consists of hostility, prejudice, discrimination, racism and xenophobia which is specifically directed at Romani people. Non-Romani itinerant groups in Europe such as the Yenish, Irish and Highland Travellers are frequently given the name "gypsy" and as a result, they are frequently confused with the Romani people. As a result, sentiments which were originally directed at the Romani people are also directed at other traveler groups and they are frequently referred to as "antigypsy" sentiments.
The Romanisael, are a Romani subgroup who have been resident in Sweden and Norway for some 500 years. The estimated number of Romanisael in Sweden is 65,000, while in Norway, the number is estimated to be around 10,000.
The Romani diaspora refers to the presence and dispersion of Romani people across various parts of the world. Their migration out of the Indian subcontinent occurred in waves, with the first estimated to have taken place in the 6th century. They are believed to have first arrived in Europe sometime between the 9th and 14th centuries, via the Balkans. They settled in the areas of present-day Turkey, Greece, Serbia, Romania, Croatia, Moldova, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Hungary, Albania, Kosovo, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Slovenia and Slovakia, by order of volume, and Spain. From the Balkans, they migrated throughout Europe and, in the 19th and later centuries, to the Americas. The Roma population in the United States is estimated at more than one million.
Scottish Romani are the Romani people of Scotland. This includes Romanichal and Lowland Romani.
The number of Romani people in Ireland is roughly estimated, as the Central Statistics Office collects its data based on nationality and not ethnic origin. For this reason a precise demographic profile of the Romani people in Ireland is not available. Some estimates Ireland give the population at 1,700 in 2004, rising to between 2,500 and 3,000 in 2005. The Romani people first migrated from northwestern India between 500 and 600 AD. They first arrived in Europe via Greece and Bulgaria around the 13th century and the majority of Romani people remained in Southeastern Europe. The first Romani people arrived in Ireland in the 16th century, although they are not believed to have established a permanent residence. There are records of Romani people residing in Ireland in small numbers since the 19th century. However, the majority of the Romani population in Ireland today derive from recent migrations, primarily from Romania, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Poland, Serbia and Italy.
The Kale are a Romani subgroup predominantly found in northwestern Wales, specifically in the Welsh-speaking areas. Romani have been present in Wales since the 16th century.
Romani people in France, generally known in spoken French as gitans, tsiganes or manouches, are an ethnic group that originated in Northern India. The exact number of Romani people in France is unknown; estimates vary from 500,000 to 1,200,000.
The Romani people are known by a variety of names, mostly as Gypsies, Roma, Romani, Tsinganoi, Bohémiens, and various linguistic variations of these names. There are also numerous subgroups and clans with their own self-designations, such as the Sinti, Kalderash, Boyash, Manouche, Lovari, Lăutari, Machvaya, Romanichal, Romanisael, Calé, Kale, Kaale, Xoraxai, Xaladytka, Romungro, Ursari and Sevlengere.
Sinte Romani is the variety of Romani spoken by the Sinti people in Germany, France, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, some parts of Northern Italy and other adjacent regions. Sinte Romani is characterized by significant German influence and is not mutually intelligible with other forms of Romani. The language is written in the Latin script.
Leeds University Library's Gypsy, Traveller and Roma Collections are one of the five Designated collections held by the Brotherton Library at the University of Leeds. The collections contain an extensive range of international books, manuscripts and archives relating to Gypsy, Traveller and Roma culture. The majority of the materials do not originate from within these communities, instead they encapsulate external representations.
Romani people have been recorded in the United Kingdom since at least the early 16th century. There are estimated to be around 225,000 Romani people residing in the UK. This includes the Romanichal, Kale, Scottish Lowland Romani and a sizeable population of Roma from Central and Eastern Europe, who immigrated into the UK in the late 1990s/early 2000s and after EU expansion in 2004. They are considered part of the Gypsy (Romani), Roma and Traveller (GRT) community.
There is estimated to be approximately 42,500 Romani people in Sweden. Romani people are one of the oldest ethnic minority groups in the country. They mainly live in Malmö, Stockholm and Gothenburg.
Gypsy, Roma and Traveller is an umbrella term used in the United Kingdom to represent several diverse ethnic groups which have a shared history of nomadism.
