The Gypsies have been important to the folk song tradition, both as carriers of songs and tunes and as main characters in the many variants of 'The Gypsy Laddies'. This article was put together from several sources.
As their name suggests, Gypsies were initially believed to have come from Egypt. Linguists compare Gypsy languages to historical languages; they look at words borrowed from other languages and when and where those words originally existed. It is possible to trace Gypsies back to their origin: the Sind area of India (today south central Pakistan -- the mouth of the Indus). Three separate emigrations occurred over the course of about four hundred years, traceable today in three identifiable linguistic populations: the Eastern Gypsy (Domari) in Egypt and the Middle East, the Central Gypsy (Lomavren) in Armenia and eastern Turkey, and the Western Gypsy (Romani) This last group is the population most widely dealt with in reference works and literature, and therefore most of the information here pertains to them.
The Gypsies' ancestors made their earliest official appearance in Europe, in modern-day Turkey, to around AD 855. By the 1300s, their migration had entered southeastern Europe; by the 1400s, western Europe. Finally, in the early 1500s, the Gypsies reached the British Isles. But the prejudices against Gypsies soon became manifest. The first anti-Gypsy Act in England was passed in 1530, just twenty-five years after the Gypsies' arrival there. The Act's intention was to rid the country of all Gypsies by banning further immigration and requiring the Gypsies already living in England to leave or suffer confiscation of their goods, imprisonment, and execution as felons. There are reports of deportations throughout the sixteenth century and of executions as late as the seventeenth century. In 1783, all existing laws directed specifically at Gypsies were repealed, but the discriminatory treatment continued in the form of new laws. Throughout the nineteenth century the various Poor Law, Vagrancy, Hawkers, Highways, Health, Housing and Education Acts resulted in Gypsies, and other nomads, being prosecuted (or threatened with prosecution) for such offences as setting fires, damaging grass by camping, possessing a dog without a licence or collar, fortune-telling, taking sticks and ferns without permission, damaging crops, and begging.
The Gypsies are a race of nomads. The Gypsies of nineteenth-century England travelled the countryside, carrying all their belongings in covered wagons and pitching tents wherever they stopped. For Gypsies, travelling is not a pastime or leisure activity, but a way of life. In fact, a common belief of the latter part of the nineteenth century suggested that the inclination to travel, called "wanderlust," was a product of genetic determinants. This view was the basis for the claim that "it was as natural for [the Gypsies] to move as it was for the majority of the population to stay in one place". Another argument of this time period was that itinerancy resulted from socialisation to a travelling way of life. Therefore, "being raised as a nomad and being accustomed to the rigours of travelling from an early age would undoubtedly have increased the likelihood of inter-generational itinerancy". Whatever its source, the Gypsies' itinerant lifestyle naturally made it necessary that their occupations involve mobility. It was in the economic sphere, then, that Gypsies interacted with settled society.
Both in the nineteenth century and today, Gypsies have played an important economic role in society. In nineteenth-century England, they made their living primarily by hawking (selling small homemade goods) and tinkering (repairing pots and pans). In this way, Gypsies filled the small-scale and irregular demands for goods and services in the non-Gypsy population. Gypsies also met the high demand for seasonal employment on farms. During the late summer and early autumn, Gypsies harvested fruits and vegetables. This kind of employment was "plentiful, regular, and temporary" and thus perfectly suited to the Gypsy lifestyle. They also followed a diverse number of other trades, such as chair-bottoming, basket-making, rat-catching, wire-working, grinding, fiddling, selling fruit, fish, and earthenware, and mending bellows. However, the Gypsy lifestyle was not all work and no play.
Aside from these labour-oriented functions, another activity in which the Gypsies have participated is entertaining. They danced, sang, and played musical instruments. However, the form of entertainment for which the Gypsies are perhaps the best known is fortune-telling. Taking advantage of the superstitious belief that they possessed magical powers which enabled them to see into the future, Gypsy women sold fortunes at fairs and made considerable profits. They read palms and tarot cards, and cast charms and spells. In nineteenth-century England, fortune-telling was the equivalent of the modern-day horoscope and taken as seriously by many. Others who considered fortune-telling foolish and unrealistic dismissed it as an easy way for the Gypsies to make money. However, fortune-telling was an important part of Gypsy tradition. While there were undoubtedly many imposters, some Gypsy women firmly believed in their abilities to see into the future. And, as Brian Vesey-Fitzgerald notes, "it must be remembered that deceit and imposture alone would never have built up and supported a practice that has withstood the passage of centuries and the constant attacks of progress. There must also be some truth".
Despite the important role Gypsies played in the nineteenth-century, they were not automatically accepted as equals in society. In fact, from the moment they set foot on European soil, the Gypsies were misunderstood and even feared. These feelings became manifest in prejudices, which led to discriminatory actions. At the same time, however, Victorian society found itself fascinated with these strange Gypsies. There was an ambiguous attitude in Victorian society toward Gypsies.
The Victorians' initial impression of the Gypsies was not a favourable one. At first, the prejudices against Gypsies had obvious sources. Settled society has always had a fear of foreigners, so naturally, "the earliest response to the 'Egyptian' immigrants was rooted, generally, in a xenophobic fear and mistrust of aliens". Besides being mistrusted as foreigners, the Gypsies fell victim to racial prejudice because of the colour of their skin. Even long before the nineteenth-century, "the conviction that blackness denotes inferiority was already well-rooted in the Western mind. The nearly black skins of many Gypsies marked them out to be victims of this prejudice".
The Gypsies also faced prejudices about their way of life. The Gypsies' travelling lifestyle aroused suspicion because of the common belief that "itinerancy served merely as a cloak for a deviant range of predatory, parasitic, and criminal activities". People were distrustful of Gypsies simply because they moved around a lot. Accompanying this mistrust was "a belief in the superiority of the settled over the nomadic culture and the incompatibility between the two" Nineteenth-century England was the perfect breeding-ground for this notion. As society became more industrialised, the population moved out of the untamed countryside and into the cities. While the rest of society settled down in permanent residences in the cities, the Gypsies continued their nomadic existence in what was now viewed as the wilderness. Thus, in contrast to the new ways of civilised, industrial society, the Gypsies' culture was seen as backward and primitive. As people became more settled, they began to feel that their way of life was normal. The presence of the wandering Gypsies challenged this, and caused many people to view them negatively because they were different.
The fortune-telling issue was also a source for suspicions about the Gypsies. Fortune-telling has always been associated with pagan ideas, so the presence of Gypsy fortune-tellers in a Victorian society dominated by the Church obviously caused a commotion. Added to the problem was the fact that the Gypsies "failed to practice with any conviction one or the other of the prevalent religions". Due to this apparent lack of religion, much of society in general thought Gypsies "to be inflicting their magical and devilish practices on an innocent, Christian society"
Victorian society was very hypocritical towards the Gypsies. As George K. Behlmer says, "precisely because the Gypsies stood apart from the mainstream of urban-industrial life, they held a special fascination for the critics of that life. What appeared to be a characteristic restlessness among Gypsies therefore evoked both romantic praise and systematic harassment during the last third of the nineteenth century". At the same time that the Gypsies were being discriminated against, they were also being romanticised. Some people in the crowded cities of the newly-industrialised society missed the simplicity of life in the country and were attracted to the free lifestyle of the Gypsies.