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Page 1
Mr Borrow has very well and truly said that it is not by passing a few
hours among Gipsies that one can acquire a knowledge of their
characteristics; and I think that this book presents abundant evidence
that its contents were not gathered by slight and superficial intercourse
with the Rommany. It is only by entering gradually and sympathetically,
without any parade of patronage, into a familiar knowledge of the
circumstances of the common life of humble people, be they Gipsies,
Indians, or whites, that one can surprise unawares those little inner
traits which constitute the _characteristic_. However this may be, the
reader will readily enough understand, on perusing these pages--possibly
much better than I do myself--how it was I was able to collect whatever
they contain that is new.
The book contains some remarks on that great curious centre and secret of
all the nomadic and vagabond life in England, THE ROMMANY, with comments
on the fact, that of the many novel or story-writers who have described
the "Travellers" of the Roads, very few have penetrated the real nature
of their life. It gives several incidents illustrating the character of
the Gipsy, and some information of a very curious nature in reference to
the respect of the English Gipsies for their dead, and the strange manner
in which they testify it. I believe that this will be found to be fully
and distinctly illustrated by anecdotes and a narrative in the original
Gipsy language, with a translation. There is also a chapter containing
in Rommany and English a very characteristic letter from a full-blood
Gipsy to a relative, which was dictated to me, and which gives a sketch
of the leading incidents of Gipsy life--trading in horses,
fortune-telling, and cock-shying. I have also given accounts of
conversations with Gipsies, introducing in their language and in English
their own remarks (noted down by me) on certain curious customs; among
others, on one which indicates that many of them profess among themselves
a certain regard for our Saviour, because His birth and life appear to
them to be like that of the Rommany. There is a collection of a number
of words now current in vulgar English which were probably derived from
Gipsy, such as row, shindy, pal, trash, bosh, and niggling, and finally a
number of _Gudli_ or short stories. These _Gudli_ have been regarded by
my literary friends as interesting and curious, since they are nearly all
specimens of a form of original narrative occupying a middle ground
between the anecdote and fable, and abounding in Gipsy traits. Some of
them are given word for word as they are current among Gipsies, and
others owe their existence almost entirely either to the vivid
imagination and childlike fancies of an old Gipsy assistant, or were
developed from some hint or imperfect saying or story. But all are
thoroughly and truly Rommany; for every one, after being brought into
shape, passed through a purely "unsophisticated" Gipsy mind, and was
finally declared to be _tacho_, or sound, by real Rommanis. The truth
is, that it is a difficult matter to hear a story among English Gipsies
which is not mangled or marred in the telling; so that to print it,
restitution and invention become inevitable. But with a man who lived in
a tent among the gorse and fern, and who intermitted his earnest
conversation with a little wooden bear to point out to me the gentleman
on horseback riding over the two beautiful little girls in the flowers on
the carpet, such fables as I have given sprang up of themselves, owing
nothing to books, though they often required the influence of a better
disciplined mind to guide them to a consistent termination.
The Rommany English Vocabulary which I propose shall follow this work is
many times over more extensive than any ever before published, and it
will also be found interesting to all philologists by its establishing
the very curious fact that this last wave of the primitive Aryan-Indian
ocean which spread over Europe, though it has lost the original form in
its subsidence and degradation, consists of the same substance--or, in
other words, that although the grammar has wellnigh disappeared, the
words are almost without exception the same as those used in India,
Germany, Hungary, or Turkey. It is generally believed that English Gipsy
is a mere jargon of the cant and slang of all nations, that of England
predominating; but a very slight examination of the Vocabulary will show
that during more than three hundred years in England the Rommany have not
admitted a single English word to what they correctly call their
language. I mean, of course, so far as my own knowledge of Rommany
extends. To this at least I can testify, that the Gipsy to whom I was
principally indebted for words, though he often used "slang," invariably
discriminated correctly between it and Rommany; and I have often admired
the extraordinary pride in their language which has induced the Gipsies
for so many generations to teach their children this difference. {0a}
Almost every word which my assistant declared to be Gipsy I have found
either in Hindustani or in the works of Pott, Liebich, or Paspati. On
this subject I would remark by the way, that many words which appear to
have been taken by the Gipsies from modern languages are in reality
Indian.
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