love of wandering, would travel far and wide. Of these families each had a sher-engro, or head man, but that they were ever united under one Rommany Krallis, or Gypsy King, as some people have insisted, there is not the slightest ground for supposing.
It is possible that many of the original Gypsy tribes are no longer in existence: disease or the law may have made sad havoc among them, and the few survivors have incorporated themselves with other families, whose name they have adopted. Two or three instances of this description have occurred within the sphere of my own knowledge: the heads of small families have been cut off, and the subordinate members, too young and inexperienced to continue Gypsying as independent wanderers, have been adopted by other tribes.
The principal Gypsy tribes at present in existence are the Stanleys, whose grand haunt is the New Forest; the Lovells, who are fond of London and its vicinity; the Coopers, who call Windsor Castle their home; the Hernes, to whom the north country, more especially Yorkshire, belongeth; and lastly, my brethren, the Smiths—to whom East Anglia appears to have been allotted from the beginning.
All these families have Gypsy names, which seem, however, to be little more than attempts at translation of the English ones:—thus the Stanleys are called Bar-engres [25], which means stony-fellows, or stony-hearts; the Coopers, Wardo-engres, or wheelwrights; the Lovells, Camo-mescres, or amorous fellows the Hernes (German Haaren) Balors, hairs, or hairy men; while the Smiths are called Petul-engres, signifying horseshoe fellows, or blacksmiths.
It is not very easy to determine how the Gypsies became possessed of some of these names: the reader, however, will have observed that two of them, Stanley and Lovell, are the names of two highly aristocratic English families; the Gypsies who bear them perhaps adopted them from having, at their first arrival, established themselves on the estates of those great people; or it is possible that they translated their original Gypsy appellations by these names, which they deemed synonymous. Much the same may be said with respect to Herne, an ancient English name; they probably sometimes officiated as coopers or wheelwrights, whence the cognomination. Of the term Petul-engro, or Smith, however, I wish to say something in particular.
There is every reason for believing that this last is a genuine Gypsy name, brought with them from the country from which they originally came; it is compounded of two words, signifying, as has been already observed, horseshoe fellows, or people whose trade is to manufacture horseshoes, a trade which the Gypsies ply in various parts of the world—for example, in Russia and Hungary, and more particularly about Granada in Spain, as will subsequently be shown. True it is, that at present there are none amongst the English Gypsies who manufacture horseshoes; all the men, however, are tinkers more or less, and the word Petul-engro is applied to the tinker also, though the proper meaning of it is undoubtedly what I have already stated above. In other dialects of the Gypsy tongue, this cognomen exists, though not exactly with the same signification; for example, in the Hungarian dialect, Pindoro, which is evidently a modification of Petul-engro, is applied to a Gypsy in general, whilst in Spanish Pepindorio is the Gypsy word for Antonio. In some parts of Northern Asia, the Gypsies call themselves Wattul [26], which seems to be one and the same as Petul.
Besides the above-named Gypsy clans, there are other smaller ones, some of which do not comprise more than a dozen individuals, children included. For example, the Bosviles, the Browns, the Chilcotts, the Grays, Lees, Taylors, and Whites; of these the principal is the Bosvile tribe.
After the days of the great persecution in England against the Gypsies, there can be little doubt that they lived a right merry and tranquil life, wandering about and pitching their tents wherever inclination led them: indeed, I can scarcely conceive any human condition more enviable than Gypsy life must have been in England during the latter part of the seventeenth, and the whole of the eighteenth century, which were likewise the happy days for Englishmen in general; there was peace and plenty in the land, a contented population, and everything went well. Yes, those were brave times for the Rommany chals, to which the old people often revert with a sigh: the poor Gypsies, say they, were then allowed to sove abri (sleep abroad) where they listed, to heat their kettles at the foot of the oaks, and no people grudged the poor persons one night’s use of a meadow to feed their cattle in. Tugnis amande, our heart is heavy, brother—there is no longer Gypsy law in the land—our people have become negligent—they are but half Rommany—they are divided and care for nothing—they do not even fear Pazorrhus, brother.
Much the same complaints are at present made by the Spanish Gypsies. Gypsyism is certainly on the decline in both countries. In England, a superabundant population, and, of late, a very vigilant police, have done much to modify Gypsy life; whilst in Spain, causes widely different have produced a still greater change, as will be seen further on.
Gypsy law does not flourish at present in England, and still less in Spain, nor does Gypsyism. I need not explain here what Gypsyism is, but the reader may be excused for asking what is Gypsy law. Gypsy law divides itself into the three following heads or precepts:—
Separate not from the husbands.
Be faithful to the husbands.
Pay your debts to the husbands.
By the first section the Rom or Gypsy is enjoined to live with his brethren, the husbands, and not with the gorgios [28] or gentiles; he is to live in a tent, as is befitting a Rom and a wanderer, and not in a house, which ties him to one spot; in a word, he is in every respect to conform to the ways of his own people, and to eschew those of gorgios, with whom he is not to mix, save to tell them hoquepenes (lies), and to chore them.
The second section, in which fidelity is enjoined, was more particularly intended for the women: be faithful to the Roms, ye juwas, and take not up with the gorgios, whether they be raior or bauor (gentlemen or fellows). This was a very important injunction, so much so, indeed, that upon the observance of it depended the very existence of the Rommany sect—for if the female Gypsy admitted the gorgio to the privilege of the Rom, the race of the Rommany would quickly disappear. How well this injunction has been observed needs scarcely be said; for the Rommany have been roving about England for three centuries at least, and are still to be distinguished from the gorgios in feature and complexion, which assuredly would not have been the case if the juwas had not been faithful to the Roms. The gorgio says that the juwa is at his disposal in all things, because she tells him fortunes and endures his free discourse; but the Rom, when he hears the boast, laughs within his sleeve, and whispers to himself, Let him try.
The third section, which relates to the paying of debts, is highly curious. In the Gypsy language, the state of being in debt is called Pazorrhus, and the Rom who did not seek to extricate himself from that state was deemed infamous, and eventually turned out of the society. It has been asserted, I believe, by various gorgio writers, that the Roms have everything in common, and that there is a common stock out of which every one takes what he needs; this is quite a mistake, however: a Gypsy tribe is an epitome of the world; every one keeps his own purse and maintains himself and children to the best of his ability, and every tent is independent of the other. True it is that one Gypsy will lend to another in the expectation of being repaid, and until that happen the borrower is pazorrhus, or indebted. Even at the present time, a Gypsy will make the greatest sacrifices rather than remain pazorrhus to one of his brethren, even though he be of another clan; though perhaps the feeling is not so strong as of old, for time modifies everything; even Jews and Gypsies are affected by it. In the old time, indeed, the Gypsy law was so strong against the debtor, that provided he could not repay his brother husband, he was delivered over to him as his slave for a year and a day, and compelled to serve him as a hewer of wood, a drawer of water, or a beast of burden; but those times are past, the Gypsies are no longer the independent people they were of yore—dark, mysterious, and dreaded wanderers, living apart in the deserts and heaths with which England at one time abounded. Gypsy law has given place to common law; but the principle of honour is still recognised
