Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 24, 1913.djvu/378

 356 Cerciuonial Ciisloius of the British Gipsies.

clearh' from the mass of material here presented is, firstl}', the Gipsies' dread of contamination, and the taboos natur- ally arising" therefrom ; and, secondly, the main features of their funeral rites, founded, as I believe, upon their dread of the clinging, lurking, or haunting presence of the ghost. These, at any rate, are intensely Gipsy. Their persistence through long ages, and their existence in our very midst to-day, add another to the many romances alike of folk- lore and of gipsy-lore. Unlike family organization they have been better preserved in the West than in the East of Europe, but like it they probably date from a time ante- cedent to the first arrival of the Gipsies in the European continent, for there is a marked absence of parallels to them in European folklore. Strongly contrasted with the unity and persistence of these taboos and funeral rites is the variety and instability of the marriage rites, a variety and instability that suggests that they originally had none at all, but acquired such as they have practised from time to time by borrowing from the gdjos with whom they are now in contact, or with whom they have been in contact within comparatively recent times, and this view is strengthened by the fact that parallels to most of them, more especially to those of the gipsies of Eastern Europe, can be found in European folklore. That they do borrow from gdjos is, I think, no longer in doubt ; at any rate, since their arrival in England they have picked up (and possibly helped to disseminate) many of our native tunes, songs and dances, medical recipes, charms, and omens. The general tenor of the customs taken as a whole, and the tone of mind that prompts them, are characteristic of a people in a low state of civilization.

•T. W. Thompson.