My Roma ancestors - a note on terminology

For over five hundred years, the Roma in England have been described by their non-Romani counterparts with the term "gypsy". This derives from "Egyptian", due to an incorrect assumption regarding the Roma's origins. When the terms Roma and Romani appear at all in pre-twentieth century sources, it is typically only an in-passing reference in some academic work, noting that it is how the "gypsies" refer to themselves. A number of different terms have been applied to Roma in the various nations they have passed through, but "Roma" itself is a universal endonym, used by Roma everywhere. It derives from the Romani word rrom ("man"), which in turn comes from doma, a member of a caste of musicians on the Indian subcontinent, perhaps ultimately being an onomatopoeic interpretation of the sound of a drum.

For as long as the word "gypsy" has existed it has been used in language which maligned and discriminated against Roma, and this continues to be the case in the twenty-first century, to the point where it is sometimes considered a slur. Today some English-speaking Roma are quite happy to refer to themselves as gypsies, but considering that I am five generations removed from my most recent Romani ancestor, and until 2023 did not even know that I had any Romani ancestors, I consider myself completely unqualified to make any reclamation of the word. Furthermore, in this project I strive to tell my ancestors' stories from their own perspective, and Romani is how the ancestors of Hope Davis would have described themsleves in their own language. For these reasons I have opted to use the words "Roma" and "Romani" (which can be used almost interachangeably, although I tend towards using the former as a noun and the latter as an adjective) when referring to my ancestors of that ethnic background. When I use the word "gypsy" at all it is only when quoting a historical source, or to illustrate the attitudes of non-Romani obersevers.