Romany language
Romany (or Romani) is the language of the Roma and Sinti, travelling peoples often referred to in English as "gypsies". They came originally from northern India and parts of Pakistan, and their language belongs to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language group.
Analysis of the Romany language has shown that it is related to those spoken in northern India, such as Hindi and Punjabi, which is believed to indicate their true geographical origin. Loanwords in Roma make it possible to trace the pattern of their migration west.
Romany is closely related to Punjabi and Pothohari, as the three languages share some identical words and grammar systems. However, one recent theory reported in Nature suggests the Roma language is most closely related to Sinhalese (Gray and Atkinson, 2003).
The Romany language is rather a collection of related languages that comprise all the members of a single genetic subgroup. Since variants of the language are only now in the process of being codified in those countries with high Roma populations (e.g. Slovakia), these variants may sometimes be classified as dialects.
External links
- http://www.eurolang.net/Languages/Romany.htm
- http://www.ethnologue.com/show_iso639.asp?code=rom
- http://web.quipo.it/minola/romani/language9.htm
- Romany - English Dictionary (http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Romany-english/)
References
- Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin (http://www.psych.auckland.ac.nz/psych/research/Evolution/Gray&Atkinson2003.pdf) (pdf)
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