Research Items

Abstract

GYPSY LINGUISTICS.—In vol. 5, No. 4, of the Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society, Prof. R. L. Turner, by his ingenious application of methods of analysis to ascertain the position of Romani in Indo-Aryan, is able to offer suggestions as to the probable date, place, and line of departure of the gypsy exodus from India. An initial criticism disposes of the theories which assign Romani an affinity with the Dard group and that of its opponents who connect it with languages now farther in India, such as Western Pahari. The failure of both schools is due, according to Prof. Turner, first to comparison of Romani with a dialect group as it exists to-day, and secondly to neglect of the differences of value in the principles of conservation and innovation as evidence for determining dialectal connexions. Taking the early isoglosses in primitive Aryan, the middle Indo Aryan of the Asokan edicts, Pali and the literary Prakrits, and the modern languages, the argument from the innovations points to an agreement between Romani and the central group and a difference from the north-west. Romani therefore belonged originally to the central group which now comprises Rajasthani Hindi, central and eastern Pahari, and perhaps Behari. Turning to conservations, Romani has preserved sounds which were radically modified in the central group after the gypsies had passed to the north-west, possibly about 250 A.D. Later innovations which arose in the north-west during the stay of the gypsies with that group appear in Romani, as might be expected. The argument is further borne out by an examination of both vocabulary and morphology. It is, however, by no means certain that the gypsies entered Persia speaking a single language, as Dr. Sampson maintains. There are striking differences of morphology and vocabulary between European, Armenian, and Syrian Romani, while many of the resemblances might be referred back to a common Indian origin rather than a postIndian period of community. Yet even if at the time they emerged from the Hindu Kush they were already separated by certain isoglosses, it is reasonable to suppose they preserved contact and exerted a certain amount of mutual linguistic influence.