Roma are found in many parts of the world today, with the largest groups living in Central and Eastern Europe. In Western Europe, Spain has the largest Roma/Gypsy population. The estimated number of Roma/Gypsies in Europe is between 10 and 12 million. In Hungary, where the REBELAH partner Kepes is based, there are around 700,000 to 900,000 Roma/Gypsies.

Studies of ethnic identity give prominence to the issue of categorization. This process has a two-fold structure: on the one hand, it is always based on self-categorization, but on the other hand, the identity of each ethnic group is also influenced by external categorization. The latter is of particular importance in shaping Roma ethnic identity, as debates over the very name of Roma or Gypsy reveal.^[1]

In academic research, some now consider the term ‘Roma’ to be the only appropriate and acceptable term, due to the negative connotations of the term ‘Gypsy’ in public and political discourse. Gypsy/Roma intellectuals at the First Roma World Congress in London in 1971 decided in favour of the term ‘Roma’. However, there are now national and international examples of groups that consider themselves to be ‘Gypsies’ and do not accept the term Roma – which originates from the Romani language – for their community, such as the Boyash or Bayash Gypsies or some Romungro groups, which continue to refer to themselves as Gypsies. Other examples also suggest that several groups, despite the negative connotations of the term, are reclaiming their former self-designation as Gypsies as an important component of their identity. Thus, in this essay I use the names somewhat interchangeably.

In the case of Roma identity/identities, research has considered the transnational nature of the Roma group as a key component. Since the Roma have not established a sovereign state throughout their history, they have a minority identity wherever they live. Apart from living a diaspora life, another important component of Roma identities is heterogeneity, the fact that Roma/Gypsies are neither territorially nor culturally homogeneous. There are many groups of Roma/Gypsies, and they are linguistically/culturally distinct from each other. They therefore have their own ethnic identities, which define them not only over and against ‘non-Gypsies’ but also over and against groups other than themselves, the ‘other’ Roma. Some researchers consider this aspect of Roma/Gypsy identity a distinguishing feature of Gypsy identity and describe it using the term ‘multidimensionality’. In doing so, they emphasize that Roma identity is shaped and interpreted exclusively in relation to other social groups; hence, it cannot be considered either separate or homogeneous.

Structural conditions are decisive in determining the settings for the shaping of Roma identity. Today, Roma identity is directly influenced from three ‘sides’: 1. at the level of a nation-state framework; 2. in terms of belonging to one’s own group; and 3. through external categorization. Individual identity is shaped at the micro level; Roma identity-discourse at the meso level; and, at the macro level, a State’s ‘Roma policy’ plays an important part.

Recent research identifies four factors that can be considered common to Gypsy life-worlds: 1. there is no single Roma/Gypsy history and culture, there are Gypsy cultures and Gypsy histories; 2. Gypsies/Roma are a transnational ethnic group, so they can always be considered a diasporic people who lived/live in minority everywhere; 3. relationships between Roma/Gypsies and the majority society can be described along the lines of the models of coexistence, as opposed to the paradigm of the history of suffering and persecution; 4. the Roma inhabit forms of minority-majority relations that are not typical of those of other ethnic groups.

The formation of the Roma/Gypsy people

The framework for the transformation into a ‘people’ was probably provided by the jati system, which still exists in today’s India and allocates specific social and economic functions to certain village communities and ethnic groups. This is far from being an Indian specialty: the linking of professions to settlement communities and ethnic groups, and the passing on of professional skills within them is widespread throughout the world, and some elements of it survived in Central and Eastern Europe until the modern era (e.g. ‘Bulgarian gardeners’, ‘tinker Slavs’, Armenian merchants). From European sources, it can be assumed that the Gypsies were engaged in metalworking in their homeland. The Gypsies brought this knowledge with them during their long migration, which accounted for the position they assumed in European economic production.

Gypsies were already present in the European territories of the Byzantine Empire by the 13th century at the latest. With the rise of the Ottoman Empire, they moved further north and appeared in the Romanian principalities sometime around the middle to the last third of the 14th century. At the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries, they crossed the boundary between Eastern and Western Christianity, and within a few decades had spread all over Europe. In Hungary, and to the east and southeast, the Gypsies created a parallel but matching society and lived in it until the end of the 19th century.

For half a millennium, before the belated but more rapid industrialization of Central Europe, the Roma lived as craftsmen, an active and much needed part of the society and economy, among other peoples. At the heart was travelling craftsmanship, primarily metalworking, along with woodworking and other skills with which they served the small pre-industrial communities that could not have afforded a permanent resident craftsman such as a blacksmith. In Western Europe, however, the same was not achieved. The economic system there did not embrace Gypsies’ knowledge of production, so they were driven out in large numbers, and only a few (less than 1000th of the total population) were allowed to stay, a number that allowed only a marginal existence.

Roma/Gypsy communities in the Carpathian Basin

We can gain a sense of the diverse patterns of social and economic integration of Roma by looking into their history in Hungary and the Carpathian Basin prior to the late 19th century, when industrialization undermined the Roma’s ability to adapt to the majority society. There are three general groupings of Hungarian Roma/Gypsies, the Romungro Gypsies, the Vlach (‘Oláh’) Gypsies and the Boyash or Bayash (Beash) Gypsies.^[2]

The Romungro Gypsies arrived continuously from the 15th century onwards, at the time of the Hungarian kingdom, with most of their groups arriving in Transylvania from the Balkans. Their language contains many Greek and Slavic elements. They arrived in horse-drawn carts and were gradually integrated into Transylvanian society. In Carpathia, the Romungro were craftsmen who lived in villages and towns. A smaller number of them worked the land as serfs on landowners’ estates. Others, under the protection of the imperial treasury, were engaged in gold mining in the Apuseni Mountains. Another group were called tax-paying fiscal Gypsies.

There were also groups which lived on the outskirts of the villages, working irregularly for their landlords, and therefore they received little remuneration. In some villages, they worked as day labourers digging trenches, making bricks and harvesting crops, etc. By the end of the 19th century, this group had linguistically assimilated into the Hungarian population. The most middle-class groups were called ‘house Gypsies’, many of whom married Hungarians and took up farming or regular craftsmanship.

A second large group of Gypsies/Roma in Hungary are the Vlach (Oláh in Hungarian) Gypsies. They spent longer periods of time in the Romanian principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia. Until the middle of the 19th century, they lived as slaves in these Romanian principalities, with their language and culture strongly influenced by the culture of the Romanian people. To escape slavery, some emigrated to Hungary as early as the 18th century, along secret routes through the Carpathian passes. Their number increased dramatically in the 19th century because they found a safer life there.

The third major linguistic/cultural group of Gypsies/Roma are the Boyash or Bayash Gypsies. They speak a dialect of the medieval variety of the Romanian language and have based their livelihoods on making and selling wooden objects (e.g. wooden spoons, spatulas, vessels). Wooden spoon makers were called ‘lingurari’, and in Hungarian communities are also called ‘kalányos’ and ‘gerebenes’.