silly gypsies!

(small note for starters........when i refer to period, it's to the time that is covered by the SCA (society for creative anachronisms), from around 650-1650 ish..............so that being said........)

so yeah, back in a research phase.................started actually doing quite a bit on gypsies, or the rom as they are known (gypsy tends to be a derogatory term, i use it becuase it is more easily understood)................and i've found some interesting info.

i might have some of this wrong, just wanted to start putting things out there..........

the first gypsy tribes were originally from india, the north-westerly section, who then moved to the extreme north.........this all happened in the early 1100's...........they would have been from rajasthan or rajput india...........were forced to migrate becuase of war..........info is unclear whether they were ousted from ancestral homes, or if they were with attacking armies and just kept moving after..........
they then moved through persia, and then through a medley of other countries, notably trebizond, the byzantine empire/constantinople, and then to the balkans around the 13th century, and then romania..........from there, in the 15th cent they moved through many more countries, by 1500 they were in the british isles, spain, norway, poland, and greece, to name a few..........

"We originated in North-Central India, migrated via the Upper-Indus Valley, Persia, the Caucuses, Armenia, Byzantium, Greece, the Kingdom of Serbia and what is now Rumania to Eastern Europe and then split off into smallish groups and made our way into all the countries of Europe." (http://www.kopachi.com/)

Language base was rajput/sanskritic, then dardic, then Persian, then Armenian, then greek, then Slavic/Serbian, then rumanian.…..
All romani dialects today contain same loan words from the above languages……..

what this (in practicality) leaves me with (as an overview) is that my garb choices are mostly in the right general area............i practice what we lovingly call MPD, or Multiple Persona Disorder.........i tend to wear viking, persian, turkish, and northern indian.............if the gypsies were originally from northern india, they would probably have worn the lengha/choli/gaghra combo (skirt, cropped top, veil) of the mughal empire.............i've been having difficulty finding info on the period garb of other empires, or the early period garb of the mughals.................i tend to wear this garb in the summer, as it is comfy, cool, and keeps the sun off.............persian is also a very comfortable style to wear, i'm still working on my summer versions, but the winter versions i have are both attractive and comfortable, and nifty enough to draw attention in the booth (yes, it's something i think about!)............about the only garb style i wear that is not in any way related to this topic is viking............way too early period for all this...........
and i didn't even know it when i started wearing all this..............i've had these outfits for several years, but have only recently started doing research and realizing i've been on the right track all along...........i just need to adjust my time periods.............

my sources for all this are all on the web currently...............

http://www.kopachi.com/ (the citation used above, site is a little sparse, but the info is easy to understand)
www.romani.org (lots of info, lots of words)
www.latchodrom.org (for people looking to put together an accurate sca persona)
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5121/patrin.htm (the patrin web journal)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Roma_history (yes it's wikipedia, it's not great, but it's a good starting point)
http://www.comm.unt.edu/histofperf/christiwells/chrono.htm (very simplistic, but easily assimilated)
http://scatoday.net/node/4115 (links list for sca gypsies, has some decent info linked in)

if there is anything i'm doing wrong, or may have missed, please feel free to drop a comment.........i've only recently started this research, and haven't really had time to assimilate........also, there is much more about post-period than there is about in period........