Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 09.djvu/466

* GYPSIES. 4U GYPSIES. Masc. Kem. Second dative rakltmsiit; rakli^nghe, •in the bo.vs.' -in tlie girls' Ace. rakMa raklU-n Voc. raklAle rakldli' Instr. ruklt'uUja riikVu'uOja Abl. rakl(-ntiHr rakiWndur Examples: E rorn^skero rakU ta raklid, 'the boys and girls of the gypsy.' Terasa yck rakU-s, 'we have a bow' E raklia 4 penela o ruklo, "the boy says to the girl.' So soven romalef 'why do you sleep. O gypsies ?' Adjective. Masc. ends in -o. fem. in -i. Excep- tions are rare, as shukar, 'beautiful'; yavir, 'other.' All the oblique cases and the entire plural end in -e. E.ainples: lacho chavo, 'good child'; lache chaveskorn, 'of the good child'; etc. Pronouns. These are fully declined, like the nouns. The personal jironouns are mc, T; til, 'you' (singular); ov, 'he'; oi, 'she'; as follows: Singular Nom. me tu or oi Gen. m&ngoro ? Mskoro Mkoro First Dat. m&ntie lute l^stc Uite Second Dat. mAnghe tdke leske lAke Ace. man tut les la Voc. me tu Inatr. mSndJn tusa iftsa l&ea .bl. m&ndar tdtar lestar Mtar Plural Nom. am^n tumfin oe Gen. am^Dgoro tum^ngoro h'ngoro First Dat. amende tumeude Wnde Second Uat. am^-agbe tumengbe l^ngbe Ace. am^n tum^n len Voc. am^n tum^n Instr. am^ndja tum^ndja Mndja Abl. aniC'adar tum^ndar l^Ddar Examples: Me isom, 'I am'; pende manghf, 'they .said to me'; tu peiighids anicnghe, 'you (sing.) said to us'; dikliiis la Idkoro dat, 'her father saw her'; astilas lasii, 'he laughed with her.' The possessive pronouns are mo, 'my' (fem. 7)1 i ; oblique cases and plural me) ; to, 'your' (sing.; fem. ti: oblique cases and plural te) ; niinro (fem. niinri), 'my'; tinro (fem. tinri), 'your,' 'yours' (sing.); leskoro (fem. hikoro), 'his,' 'hei's'; amiiro (fem. ainnri), 'ours'; tumaro (fem. iumari). 'yours' (plur.) ; lenfjoro (masc. and fem.), 'their,' 'theirs.' The demonstrative pronouns are: ukd or orakii. 'this' (fem. iikiii nr avakiii, plur. aklc or nrakic). The interrogative is kon, masc., fully declined ; and so. defective, neuter; and the relative is ka, indeclinable. Examples: Mo chavo, 'ray boy'; mi rakli, 'my girl'; mc chare, 'my children'; to vast, 'your (sing.) hand'; tinro sukarib^, 'your (sing.) beaxity'; leskoro grast, 'his horse'; Irskere dant, 'his teeth': hikoro pral, 'her brother': akd rnkld, 'this boy'; arakle gnvcste. 'in this village'; Icon kachel, 'who will be left?' ta tu, so penes mdnghe, 'and you. what do you say to me?' Numerals (all Hindu, except 'seven,' 'eight.' 'nine,' from the Greek ) : Yek, 'one' ; due, 'tw'o' ; tiiv. 'three'; f.htar, 'four'; ponch, 'five';is/ior, 'six'; eftd, 'seven'; okhto. 'eight'; enea, 'nine'; desh. 'ten'; desh-u-i)pk. 'eleven.' etc.; bish, 'twen- ty'; bish-n-pek, 'twenty-one,' etc. Verbs. The conjugation of verbs, regular and irregular, is exceedingly complex and full. As a general example, the regular verb ddva, 'to give,' will suffice. Presen t Imperfect d.'irns dSsas dfsas dfuas dflaa dfnas Second aohst diBi6mas dinidmas dinei'iDas diaiAaan diuiis dinHtn First aorist dmi6m dini&m dini^D dwiAa diiii^s dint As Future kamad&ra kamad&sa kamadfisa kamad^la kamaditna kamad^na de, 'give!' Imperative Subjunctive tedS ra te dfea te d^na dind • taken ' den, 'give!' (plur.) te d&sa te d^na te dena Participle (fem. dini: plur. din. dAva, '1 give* dfifta, ' you give * d^la, 'lie gives' dAsa. ' we give' dfinn, ' you give" d^na, ' they give' E.vamples: Kerava, 'I make'; tcrclas hut cha- veil, 'he had many children'; so kamavela, 'what will come?' me ehinghiom les, 'I killed him.' It will readily be seen from the above resume that romani, where well preserved, is a fully developed and highly inflectional language. This character it has kept where the gj'psies live in large numbers, as in Hungary, for instance; but in every country it has received many inlluences from without. In Hungarian, the word-accent falls invariably on the first syllable, and this has inlluenced the Hungarian dialect. Thus, what would be pronounced raklo, 'boy,' i-akli, 'girl,' in Turkey, would become rdklo. rakli. in Hun- gary and in all the gv-psy dialects of the farther west. A word about the corrupt English dialect. When the gypsies arrived in England, early in the sixteenth century, they spoke roiiiaiii of a pure and inflectional character. But association with the country people, and especially with the questionable gentry of the horse-fairs and the roads, caused their speech to become more and more corrupt, until to-day it is the English grammar applied to several hundred gypsy words. The old .gypsy men and women who spoke the 'real language,' tacho romani jib, are dead, and fheir descendants have forgotten it: but for- tunately scholars took it from their lips before it disappeared. Almost every inflected form of romani may be found in the English dialect. Thus, of the verb; kerdvu, kei'csa, kerrla, kerena, k^rdo, "I, you, he, they make,' 'made,' are re- corded; but the English gypsies of to-day, in- stead of nie kerdra, 'I make,' say indnde kers (using the English vulgar termination -s in 'I makes'), tnte kers, lesti k-ers, etc. The migrations of the English gvpsies are veiy discernible in their language. The basic stock is Indian; the Persian has svipplied many wcu'ds. as derrudl, dovydl, 'sea,' vesh or loesh, 'forest': the Armenian .several, as gra.<it, 'horse,' c7tor, 'deep'; not a few are from the Greek, as drom, 'road" (I'ipd/jnr), pet'l 'horseshoe' (w^TaXov). stndi, 'hat' {cKidSi) ; the Slavic languages have furni.shed, among others, krdlis. 'king,' kichcma. 'inn,' lorinor, 'beer;' while German is represented by stifi-pal and stifi-pcn (.'v7ie/bruder. ShV/'schwester), and French, as seme think, by biti. 'little' (petit). Tiepresentative specimens of several romani dialects arc here appended for comparison. Non- romani words and forms are given in italics. Turkish Dialect (Paspati, p. 600) : Yek A dakilr terclas trinto rakl^n, dinifis e khurdfs king had three eons he gave to the youngest