Guest Post: The Roma
Marie Soltesz, Opre: A Modern History of the Roma (Berlin: National Public Press, 1998)
“The Great War disproportionately affected Romani communities. Most Roma were concentrated in a few states: The Russian Empire, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary, Slovakia and Bohemia-Moravia. All of these states except for Romania saw immense devastation due to the war. Communities were stripped of men for the meat-grinder, crops were burnt and whole populations uprooted in the path of advancing armies. The Roma themselves suffered more than others. Most Roma were impoverished agricultural labourers or itinerant tradespeople, and Roma were generally clannish and isolated from their neighbours. This made them the last in line for government aid, particularly when states, seeing Roma as natural wanderers, expected them to care for themselves. Like most communities, many Romani men were drafted into national armies and died fighting on the Balkan front.
The end of the war brought yet more misery, with the ethnic conflicts that followed. Hungarian, German, Slovak and Romanian armies, hoping to consolidate control over their territory, frowned upon the presence of “foreign” ethnic groups. The Roma, who lacked a homeland all together, were distrusted by all as spies and wanderers. Roma were thus persecuted and periodically massacred by all sides, with many communities displaced by fighting in Croatia, the Bergenland, Slovakia and Transylvania. When the dust of the conflict finally settled, close to 15 percent of the region’s Romani population had died from massacres, starvation and disease.
For many Roma, the message was clear: their old heartland in the Balkans was no longer inhabitable. A surprising number of people found a place of refuge in the Kingdom of Eastern Transylvania, where the Romanian puppet king István Bethlen, desperate to repopulate his devastated land, recognized their language and customs. Still, many others fled the heartland…
Some Roma migrated to the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans, whose Balkan territory had been depopulated, recruited Romani refugees with offers of progressive tenancy arrangements or even free land for experienced farmers or Muslims. The Ottomans saw Roma, who lacked a strong national movement or intellectual class, as settlers who would remain quiet and help dilute the restive populations of Greeks, Bulgarians and other South Slavs, particularly Bulgaria. While this stream slowed to a trickle after the 1911 Ottoman Revolution and the granting of Bulgarian autonomy, Roma now made up close to 20 percent of the region’s population.
Other Roma moved north: Germany’s post-war labour shortage had created openings for hundreds of thousands of jobs. Romani labourers trickled into Germany’s industrial cities, often settling amongst the German Roma Sinti and assimilating into their customs. While the often-illiterate Romani workers were often discriminated against, given the worst and most dangerous jobs, others were very successful. Romani familial and clan networks helped facilitate business across international boundaries, and in Germany’s Central and Southeastern European economic satellites, some Roma grew extremely wealthy as import-export merchants. Others, such as the Hungarian Kalderash, known for their coppersmithing skills, became greatly prized in high-value manufacturing.
By the beginning of the 1920s, the future for the Roma looked positive. While Roma still experienced discrimination everywhere, the cosmopolitan capitalism of Germany and the revolutionary pluralism of the Ottoman Empire both encouraged tolerance. While the Congo flu hurt the Roma in Europe, with some politicians blaming “Gypsy wanderers” for the spread of the disease, the Roma continued to integrate into German society. In the Ottoman Empire, Roma communities remained mostly isolated in rural areas, with Romani “kings” holding a tight grip on political power. However, the slow but steady spread of Islam among the settlers began to influence their values, particularly with the arrival of Mohammed Nuri, a Syrian Rom merchant and Belloist preacher, in Turnovo in 1922…
In Germany, Roma generally lived in close proximity to each other as well as other peoples. Some Roma inevitably came into contact with Indian migrants, where the similarities between languages from the northeast of India and the Romani tongue were too many to ignore. Investigated more closely in 1908 by linguist and anthropologist Dr. Pavel Reguly, the theory that the Roma were a lost Indic people soon overwhelmed other theories to become the primary narrative of Romani origins. Cultural and economic ties emerged between Roma and Indian communities, and intellectuals began efforts to codify the fragmented Romani language, Romanes, often using Hindustani loan words for the many gaps. As time went on, some Roma, educated and settled but longing for a homeland of their own, turned their eyes to India…”
The bell rang, and Yanko Varga looked up from his papers. Running a gambling racket before the war in Bratislava had taught him how to run the books on a business, and selling horses, usually “lost” from some gentleman’s ranch, had taught him how to hustle. It served him well, even here in the Bombay sun. The war in Europe had thrown a rifle in his hands and sent him off to fight the Germans. He had gotten wounded and sent home. After the war, without jobs and with yet another war on, Yanko had wandered up to Germany. He had Kalderash cousins working at the shipyards in Kiel who got him a job at an ammunition plant. There, he had worked with an Indian, a soldier who had married a German girl and settled down after the war. He had gotten involved in the union movement and learned Hindustani, not so hard for a Romanes-speaker. When he suddenly needed to get out of town in a hurry, India seemed like a good destination: hot, exotic, and most importantly far from the reach of the German police. One thing led to another, and now…
The customer was a tall man, clearly a Sikh from his turban. He didn’t look like most Sikhs though; he was half-
kaffir if Yanko had ever seen one. His clothes looked dusty and wrinkled from travel. Bending over, he inspected the assortment of wares and baubles laid out in the front of the store.
“
Sidi, how can I help you? Anything you are looking for in particular?”
The Sikh looked up and shook his head slightly, then looked back down. Yanko reached out with some of his flashier ornaments. “A bracelet for your wife? How about a ring? I have anything you’d want here, from all corners of the world.”
Without looking up, the Sikh answered. “No wife.”
Yanko smiled even wider. “Ahh, all on your own!
Sidi, I can introduce you to the most beautiful women. Very welcoming too.” He winked at the Sikh, for good measure.
The man straightened stiffened slightly, as though insulted. Curtly, he said, “I think I’ve seen all there is to see here. Good day.” Before Yanko could even respond, the Sikh turned sharply and walked from the shop.
“Good day,
sidi,” said Yanko. Cursing under his breath, he shook his head. In the old days, he wouldn’t have been sloppy enough to let a customer get away like that. The war had done something to him, especially the second time around. Getting wounded in the trenches had been one thing, but the Indian war was an entirely different animal. The villages destroyed, people starved, gas and mass graves; from what he’d heard, it was a whole lot like what the Roma faced after Hungary fell apart.
He turned back to his papers just as the bell rang again. He looked up, and a huge grin came to his face.
“Slobo!
Pa gesi bre!” He hadn’t seen his war buddy since Diwali. The Serbian Rom was a tall, thin, dark-skinned man. The war had left many scars, most notably a missing eye.
Slobodan frowned –his usual expression- and answered in Romanes. “All is good. How are you brother?” he said, sitting down on the customer’s bench. Yanko poured two cups of the sugary tea he always had ready for the customers and, handing one to Slobodan, sat down beside him.
“Fine! Just lost a customer, I’m getting too old for this. I should find myself a nice girl and settle down. But, such is life. I’m getting bored, Slobo. Restless.”
“I know that feeling.” Slobodan said, sipping his tea. His face brightened all of a sudden. “Have you heard about the Congress?”
“You know I don’t follow politics, Slobo. But sure, what happened? Another scandal?”
“No, not the Indian Congress. The Romani National Congress”
Yanko piqued his ears. “Roma?”
“Some veterans from the war are bringing us together. I heard some of them speak after a Dal rally. They want to liberate the Roma like the Indians and the Malê liberated themselves. It’s not just Indians; there are Germans and Ottomans and others there too. They’re having a meeting in an hour or so. Will you come with me?”
Yanko sipped his tea and looked around. His old leg wound ached, and he would have to close the store early. Still…
“Why not?”
Slobodan grinned, a rare sight. “Perfect!
Ajde Yanko! Let’s get something to eat first though. On me.”
Yanko smiled back. “On you? Never thought I’d see the day.”
