The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1912-09-26

| temporarily SilCdiupSu "iIhiH 111o
alien boundaries of Greater New
York. 1t makes a pretty story to be
read and forgotten. Gripped with
the pains of hunger, Romany band
runs amuck among the coast towns
of Jersey, and after the good old
manner of correcting sturdy beggars
! it's members are beaten from tithlng
to tithing until they melt away be-
yond the borders. A social career
in exclusive Baltimore is abandoned
for life on the open trail until the
gipsy kings consort surrenders her
life to motherhood, and is brought
home to sleep among her. own people.
Such incidents are but the f1otsam
| on the sea of current events. Tney
excite a momentary interest and the
gipsy and all his works are put out
of mind. And yet not one of all the
races of the earth is so enshrouded
in romance and mystery, while few
have exercised more important in
| fuence on the unfolding history OF
the times.
Studies based chiefly upon the
| structure of their language have IN
| recent years resulted in common
agreement that the gypsies were orig
| inally from India. In the first stage
| of their migrations they settled in
the Balkan peninsula, only to be driv-
en- westward by wave after wave OF
invading Turks. The name they gave
themselves is derived from the word
Rom, which simply means man, and
Romani meaning woman. When
they started on their great trek for
the west of Europe, in the middle OF
the fifteenth century, their leader
bore a letter of recommendation and
safe conduct from the Emperor
Sigismund. They were kindly re-
ceived. In four centuries and a half
their characteristics have changed so
little that, then as now, they Wera
tinkers, horsetraders, and above all,
fortune tellers. 1t is generally agreed
that they were the first to bring play
ing cards into Europe. Then as now,
they were natural musicians and
dancers. Liszt insisted that the ma
tional music of Hungary was wholly
indebted to the gipsies.
But then, as now, they were petty
pilferers and were soon suspected
of graver crimes. In their magic IN
carnations they invoked the name OF
Lilith, the generic patroness of child
stealing. Suspicion soon took form
in severe laws against those wicked
people, known as Egyptians. Having
no religion of their own they were
ever ready to adopt a veneer of the
prevailing creed, wherever they might
be. In western Europe they told a
weird story of having come from a
country of their own known as Little
Egypt, where they had sinned against
the light, and were on a penitentlal
pilgrimage But even the church at
last had to withdraw it's protection.
Fifty years of immunity was followed
by four hundred years of restriction
and sometimes of persecution. In
Germany no longer ago than 1907
there was "drive'' of gipsies as the
elimination of a long period of grow
ing hostility.
1t was in the beginning of the fif-
teenth century that they made their
first appearance in England and Scot
land. There they soon made COM
mon cause with the wandering vag-
abonds and beggars with the result
that they gave an impetus to the Ian
guage of thieves which is one of the
most interesting studies of the ety.
mologists The very word slang
was their own name for the language
they spoke-together with it's syno-
nym "gibberish.' In Cribb's Clip
sizes Advocate" written in 1881, 1t
is definitely set forth:
This (Gipsy) language, called by
themselves slang, or gibberish, in
vented as they think by their fore
fathers for secret purposes, is not
merely the language of one or of
few of these wandering tribes, but is
adopted by the vast numbers that in
habit the earth" Such Gypsy terms
as "bamboozle, " Hockey" and "pal"
have found their way into the Ian
guage of everyday life.
History and literature furnish few
characters more piquant than Bam-
fyle Moore Carew, prince of char
latans and titular king of mendicants.
The native wanderlust was strong
upon him from childhood, and in spite
of his oent1e blood and all the ef-