Frank Cuttriss - Romany Life

ROMANY LIFE

DSHA.

EXPERIENCED AND OBSERVED DURING
MANY YEARS OF FRIENDLY INTERCOURSE
WITH THE GYPSIES
BY
FRANK CUTTRISS
ILLUSTRATED WITH A LARGE NUMBER OF UNIQUE
PHOTOGRAPHS AND OTHER PICTURES BY THE AUTHOR
MILLS & BOON LIMITED
49 RUPERT STREET
LONDON, W.

First published 1915

I T is a curious fact, that while very few can be found nowadays to accept without question, fanciful or otherwise, unscientific statements concerning natural objects or supernatural happenings, many time-worn, misleading accounts of gypsies and what they are supposed to dobut do notare still implicitly credited by a great majority of thinking people. A solution of this may be looked for in one or other of the following surmises, perhapsmore or lessin all:

Hearsay, in matters concerning the gypsies, even when emanating from presumably reliable sources, cannot altogether be relied upon. Unless one lives among them and as one of them, goes freely to and fro, sees and hears for himself, understanding the while most of what may be said in Romany, slang and English,a lingual conglomerate heard nowhere but among these people,his accounts will be of little value in depicting aspects of Romany life.

Just how much truth, if any, there may be in the invariable assertion by gypsies, that I have a good deal of the true Romany in my composition, I am unable to say; there can, however, be no doubt whatever of their belief in it, nor that their tenacity on the point, coupled with my adaptability to their manner of life, and my use of their tongue (which I cannot but admit seems to me a language I might have used in a previous existence), have proved a veritable open sesame, admitting me to the innermost circle of friendship, and enabling me, while not breaking faith with them, to describe truthfully, customs and aspects of their life which do not come within the ken of the gorgio or non-gypsy.

Although it might be considered by some, that the insertion of a certain amount of fiction would add glitter to my narration, I have religiously refrained from making any such addition, feeling that the work, in so far as it is a revelation of little-known aspects of Romany life, would, under such conditions, lose its entire value.

Frank Cuttriss.

A glossary of most of the Romany and cant words it has been expedient to use in this work, together with English equivalents, will be found at the end.

N.B.It must be distinctly understood that none of the incidents related in this book must be taken to apply, or to allude in any way to any living persons, and that the photographs must not be considered as having any connection with any particular incident related.

ROMANY LIFE

T HE terms gypsy and tramp are by many considered synonymous. It is not, however, by any means the case, for while gypsies may be, and sometimes are, mistaken for tramps, the genuine professional tramp and the Tachey Romany, or true gypsy, have very little in common.

The tramp may perhaps be described as one who is dominated by the early instincts of our race,instincts which in every one of us are but just below the veneer of civilization,for we know that in the infancy of the human race man was perforce of a roving, restless and predatory disposition, driven by circumstances to wander in search of food, and, as in the case of plants which have been improved,civilized, if you will, by cultivation,there is always the tendency to return to the primitive state, so every civilized man is more or less insistently urged by Nature to disregard the conventions of Society, to live in the open air and to wander.

We may then take it that the professional tramp demonstrates this instinct combined with a detestation of honest toil. Such men sometimes depart from the ways of their kind and adopt the manner of life of the gypsy, and, when living under such conditions, they are, in some districts, designated Mumpers. Sometimes these mumpers intermarry with the gypsies, adopt their mode of living and assimilate many of their customs and portions of their language, with the result that their progeny exhibit many of the true Romany characteristics. Sometimes such half-caste gypsies are called diddecoys, but one also hears the term loosely applied to the true gypsy. I have heard it most frequently by the people of Hampshire, and occasionally by the gypsies themselves. A man once said to me, I aint an old diddecoy like my missus; I was born in a house, but shes always been a travelling lady.