Dora d'Istria y los gitanos rumanos

Abstract

Authors from various areas, especially the women's studies sector, have recently been rediscovering the work of Dora d’Istria, alias Elena Ghica, a nineteenth century Rumanian scholar who wrote considerable comparative accounts of the conditions of woman in Western and Eastern Europe. She was also the first woman in history to speak about the conditions of Gypsy women and this article attempts to analyse the way in which these women were described. In particular, it reconstructs the historical-political situation of Wallachia in the first half of the nineteenth century, placing Elena in the genealogy of the Ghica princes, a noble family within the principality, and re-discusses the slavery situation that Gypsies in the region were then subject to. The article therefore analyses the personal and contradictory situation of Dora d'Istria who, a champion for female emancipation, described the Gypsies sweetly and expurgated the existence of female Gypsy slaves with whom she would have had contact in her youth