Dictionary of gypsy mythology - charms, rites, and magical traditions of th

Although their own myths and their common name point to an Egyptian origin for the gypsies, the Rom, as they call themselves, originated in India, as shown by studies of their language. They arrived in Europe in the ninth century and spread across the continent from East to West, reaching England in the 15th century and Scandinavia by the end of the 16th century. A nomadic people, these wanderers were reviled by local people wherever they went and regarded as misfits, intruders, foreigners and thieves. Drawing on a number of sources never before available outside of Eastern Europe, Claude Lecouteux reconstructs the gypsy oral tradition to provide a comprehensive A-to-Z look at gypsy mythology, including their folktales, rites, songs, nursery rhymes, jokes and magical traditions. His main source is material collected by Heinrich Adalbert von Wlislocki (1856-1907), an ethnologist who lived with gypsies in Romania, Transylvania and Hungary in the latter half of the 19th century. He