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The Romani people, also known as the Roma, are an ethnic group of Indo-Aryan origin who traditionally lived a nomadic, itinerant lifestyle. Linguistic and genetic evidence suggests that the Roma 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 arrived in Europe around the 13th to 14th century. Although they are widely dispersed, their most concentrated populations are believed to be in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Serbia and Slovakia.
Romani is an Indo-Aryan macrolanguage of the Romani communities. According to Ethnologue, seven varieties of Romani are divergent enough to be considered languages of their own. The largest of these are Vlax Romani, Balkan Romani (600,000), and Sinte Romani (300,000). Some Romani communities speak mixed languages based on the surrounding language with retained Romani-derived vocabulary – these are known by linguists as Para-Romani varieties, rather than dialects of the Romani language itself.
The Sinti are a subgroup of Romani people. They are found mostly in Germany, France and Italy and Central Europe, numbering some 200,000 people. They were traditionally itinerant, but today only a small percentage of Sinti remain unsettled. In earlier times, they frequently lived on the outskirts of communities.
The Dom are descendants of the Dom caste with origins in the Indian subcontinent which through ancient migrations are found scattered across the Middle East and North Africa, the Eastern Anatolia Region, and parts of the Balkans and Hungary. The traditional language of the Dom is Domari, an endangered Indo-Aryan language, thereby making the Dom an Indo-Aryan ethnic group.
Caló is a language spoken by the Spanish and Portuguese Romani ethnic groups. It is a mixed language based on Romance grammar, with an adstratum of Romani lexical items, through language shift by the Romani community. It is said to be used as an argot, or a secret language, for discreet communication amongst Iberian Romani. Catalan, Galician, Portuguese, and Spanish caló are closely related varieties that share a common root.
There have been many languages spoken in the Iberian Peninsula.
There are independent groups currently working toward standardizing the Romani language, including groups in Romania, Serbia, the United States and Sweden.
Domari is an endangered Indo-Aryan language, spoken by Dom people scattered across the Middle East and North Africa. The language is reported to be spoken as far north as Azerbaijan and as far south as central Sudan, in Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Syria and Lebanon. Based on the systematicity of sound changes, it is known with a fair degree of certainty that the names Domari and Romani derive from the Indo-Aryan word ḍom. Although they are both Central Indo-Aryan languages, Domari and Romani do not derive from the same immediate ancestor. The Arabs referred to them as Nawar as they were a nomadic people that originally immigrated to the Middle East from the Indian subcontinent.
Baltic Romani is a group of dialects of the Romani language spoken in the Baltic states and adjoining regions of Finland, Poland, Russia, and Ukraine. Half of Baltic Romani speakers live in Poland. Romani began as an Indo-European language, which morphed into an Indo-Iranian language, and then into an Indo-Aryan language. After that the Romani language broke down into Balkan Romani and Central Romani. Baltic Romani came from the Central Romani dialect which branches off into other dialects. There are a total of around 31,500 users in all countries.
The presence of Romani people in Ukraine, locally referred to as the Цигани/Cyhany, was first documented in the early 15th century. The Romani maintained their social organizations and folkways, shunning non-Romani contacts, education and values, often as a reaction to anti-Romani attitudes and persecution. They adopted the language and faith of the dominant society, being Orthodox in most of Ukraine, Catholic in Western Ukraine and Zakarpattia Oblast, and Muslim in Crimea.
The Romani people of Greece, or Romá, are called Tsinganoi, Athinganoi (Αθίγγανοι), or the more derogatory term Gyftoi. On 8 April 2019, the Greek government stated that the number of Greek Roma citizens in Greece is around 110,000. Other estimates have placed the number of Romani people resident in Greece as high as 350,000.
Balkan Roma, Balkaniko Romanes, or Balkan Gypsy is a specific non-Vlax dialect of the Romani language, spoken by groups within the Balkans, which include countries such as Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Greece, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Serbia, Slovenia, Turkey etc. The Balkan Romani language is typically an oral language.
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, 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, Kale, Kaale, Xoraxai and Romungro.
Erromintxela is the distinctive language of a group of Romani living in the Basque Country, who also go by the name Erromintxela. It is sometimes called Basque Caló or Errumantxela in English; caló vasco, romaní vasco, or errominchela in Spanish; and euskado-rromani or euskado-romani in French. Although detailed accounts of the language date to the end of the 19th century, linguistic research began only in the 1990s.
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.
Carpathian Romani, also known as Central Romani or Romungro Romani, is a group of dialects of the Romani language spoken from southern Poland to Hungary, and from eastern Austria to Ukraine.
Milena Hübschmannová (1933-2005) was Czech professor of Romani studies at Charles University of Prague. She was one of the leading experts on Romani society and culture, as well as Romani language. She founded the academic study program on the Roma at Charles University and actively opposed their assimilation into the greater culture. She wrote a Romani-Czech and Czech-Romani dictionary and collected many of the stories of the Roma, translating them for posterity. The program she founded was the first program worldwide to offer a degree program to undergraduates in Romani Studies.
The various regional and minority languages in Europe encompass four categories:
References
- ↑ Matras, Y. Romani: A Linguistic Introduction Cambridge University Press (2002) ISBN 0-521-63165-3
- ↑ Matras, Yaron (5 October 2010). Romani in Britain. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 9780748687015 – via Google Books.
- ↑ Hubschmannova, Milena; Kalinin, Valdemar; Kenrick, Donald (28 April 2018). What is the Romani Language?. Univ of Hertfordshire Press. ISBN 9781902806068 – via Google Books.
- ↑ Hubschmannova, Milena; Kalinin, Valdemar; Kenrick, Donald (28 April 2018). What is the Romani Language?. Univ of Hertfordshire Press. ISBN 9781902806068 – via Google Books.
- ↑ "Romani and Turkish". "Was ich noch sagen wollte…". Akademie Verlag. 2001. pp. 303–326. doi:10.1515/9783050079851-022. ISBN 9783050079851.
- ↑ "'Этнография народов Крыма' - Статьи: Забытое племя". Archived from the original on 2004-01-24. Retrieved 2010-10-20.
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