Walter Benjamin - Radio Benjamin

4The Liber Vagatorum , which discusses the varieties of beggars’ tricks and dodges as well as their language, was published anonymously c. 1509. Luther’s edition and preface first appeared in 1528.

You’ve probably never had the courage to climb the wheel spokes of a Gypsy wagon and look inside. But I’m sure you’ve all been tempted to; I know I have, whenever I see one creeping down a country road from afar. By the way, do you know where in Germany you’re most likely to come across one of these wagons? In East Prussia. Why? Because the region is sparsely populated and it’s much too far for people to go to the cities for distraction. The traveler folk know this, and that’s why you run into them so often in these areas. Of course these travelers are not all Gypsies, but there are quite a few who are; these days, however, we only encounter Gypsies in small groups of tightrope walkers, fire-eaters, or bear tamers. It was a good 500 years ago, during the rule of Emperor Sigismund, that they invaded Germany in large mobs almost like an armed tribe; since then, even as they held fast to their language and customs, their cohesion has grown ever weaker. Now there are hardly any more large bands of Gypsies, but mostly just large individual families.

These families are large because Gypsies have lots of children. They do not, thank goodness, rely on stealing small children from strangers. Over centuries, of course, this sort of thing has happened now and again. But one can rightfully accuse the Gypsies of enough dirty tricks that there is no need to denounce them for things of which they’re innocent. All the same, they’ve earned their bad reputation. When they crossed the German border in large hordes in 1417 they were initially received quite well. Emperor Sigismund granted them a letter of protection, which was occasionally given to foreigners in those days. Perhaps you know that now and again the Jews also received such letters of protection from the German Emperor. Whether these always helped is another matter. In any case, such letters provided their bearers with a number of important rights: they could not be deported, they were answerable directly to the Emperor and they had their own jurisdiction. And so it was for the Gypsies. Their kings, or voivodes as they were called, administered justice over their people and enjoyed safe passage. Just think of the tall tales they had to invent to obtain this. As for their origins, they said they hailed from Little Egypt. Not a word of it is true. But people believed them for hundreds of years, until the nineteenth century, when a great linguist — a friend of the brothers Grimm, a name familiar to you — spent many years studying the Gypsy language. He figured out that they came from Hindustan, in the highlands of West Asia. They must have suffered terribly in ancient times, for not a trace of this history remains in their lore. To this day they have — and this is rather puzzling — an immense pride in their national character, yet virtually none of their historical memory has been preserved, not even in legends. And why did they say they came from Little Egypt? The answer is very simple: in those days Europeans generally believed that Egypt was the birthplace of magic. And from the beginning it was magic that the Gypsies used to gain respect. It must be remembered that despite outward appearances they were a weak and unwarlike people; they needed some other way to assert themselves besides the threat of violence. Thus, deception through magic was not only a way to make a living, but also a recourse to their instinct for self-preservation. The centuries-long campaign against the Gypsies by the German police would not have been so drawn-out, and largely so futile, if not for the patronage of uneducated people, especially peasants. A house where a Gypsy child was born was alleged to be safe from fire; if a horse became so ill that it could no longer work, a Gypsy’s help was sought; if a peasant heard talk of treasures buried in a field, a nearby wood, or the ruins of a castle, he was likely to consult a Gypsy, for they were known as highly skilled at unearthing hidden treasure. This of course gave them opportunities for many lucrative schemes. Upon arriving in a new region, a favorite trick was to make a horse or ox artificially sick, and then to promise the desperate peasants an immediate cure in return for a good reward. And because they knew the cause of the illness they could cure the animal in no time at all, thereby further establishing their reputation for magical powers.

However, when it came to dealing with important people concerning the affairs of their tribe, they used altogether different methods. They cited letters stating they had originally lived in Egypt as Christians but had turned apostate, upon which the pope forced them to roam the world for seven years as penitence. Thus they were forbidden to settle in one place. Some contrived even more elaborate tales: because their forefathers had refused to harbor Mary when she fled to Egypt with the baby Jesus, they are forced to wander the Earth without peace. You may be wondering about the Gypsies and their Christian beliefs. They were just an invention to stir sympathy or, as in the story of King Herod, dread among Westerners. 1Although doubtless the Gypsies once had a religion, its features are difficult to glean from their dark practices and even harder to ascertain from their folk legends, for, while their customs have remained fairly undiluted, their legends are a ragbag of their own fables and those invented by others. The greatest proof that they no longer have a religion is the ease with which they conform to others’ customs when expected to do so. For instance they attach very little significance to being married by a preacher, and even allow him to baptize their children. Old police circulars recall that baptisms of Gypsy children required close monitoring, as Gypsies would often have their children baptized multiple times to receive more of the gifts handed out on such occasions.

The letter of protection the Gypsies received from the Emperor did not remain valid for long. They became a burden, and in 1497 an expulsion decree was issued that called for all Gypsies to leave Germany by a certain date; any Gypsy who stayed was declared an outlaw and could be punished by anyone with impunity. Such orders were issued frequently over the years, sometimes for all of Germany and sometimes just for particular regions. As recently as March 31, 1909, the German parliament discussed how best to deal with the Gypsies. The public threats and bans had proved ineffective. Policemen, missionaries, and teachers considered the possibility of attaining better results with milder and more humane methods. Their idea was to move family groups of Gypsies into permanent settlements that lay far from one another. This plan began well, but when the first Gypsy schools were established, it was next to impossible to get the adult Gypsies to return home after walking their children to school. They were intent on remaining in class and learning along with the children. It also proved futile to get them to settle in one place. If they were given a hut, they would abandon it straightaway for a tent right next to it, provided the weather was not bitter cold. They stubbornly clung to this freedom of movement. They’re not lazy; in a pinch they can earn their living as tinkers, cobblers, sieve makers, and wire workers. But under no circumstances will they be persuaded to farm. Emperor Joseph II of Austria came to understand this as well. He was the first to attempt to improve life for the Gypsies in a more humane way. It was the 1760s, in Hungary, during a time of frightful persecution of the Gypsies. The rumor had arisen that secretly the Gypsies were cannibals. Many of them had been captured and executed before Joseph II intervened. But he wanted to do more: with the hope of encouraging them to become more sedentary, and above all to work the land, he forbade the Gypsies from performing magic or street entertainment anywhere in the empire, except in bad weather when the fields could not be farmed. But this didn’t help at all. The Gypsies stuck to their ways and continued to roam. The government tolerated them all the less for having acted as spies for invading troops. Their feel for the terrain and their extraordinary knowledge of the land often proved helpful for generals of enemy armies; Wallenstein had used their services during the Thirty Years’ War. So everything remained as before; even in winter, the Gypsies opted for any sort of shelter other than a house. Mostly they lived in earthen caves, shielding themselves from the elements with planks or large cloths carefully arranged to ensure that no fresh air would enter their abodes. In the middle there was a fire; around it lounged a group of half-naked figures. The talk was not of washing, cleaning, or mending; at most there was a flat cake cooking in the ashes, not in a pan, of course. Their only activities were cooking, roasting, eating, smoking tobacco, chatting, and sleeping. Or so claims a schoolmaster from Langensalza, who in 1835 wrote a very unfriendly book about the Gypsies to encourage the authorities to crack down on them more harshly. 2But not all that he wrote should be taken as fact. No one could understand less about the Gypsies than this old breed of schoolmaster. And he’s certainly wrong about their idleness.