WALLACE SABINE FILE #144 Papers on Folk

WALLACE SABINE FILE #144
Papers on Folk-Lore and Music
by
A. T. Sinclair
"F 'f~. Wi>.li...CA..~· ~
#Vd;i
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---REPRINTED FROM THE JOURNAL OF AMERICAN FOLK-LORE
VoL. XXI.- APRIL-SEPT., 1908.-No. LXXXI
t- .
206
:Journal of A merz"can Folk-Lore.
sing for their bears to dance, "La, ri, rond~n" (rondin, "a club"), which
·
the poor bear well understands.
These leaders often find in the United States that the bear is the
principal attraction, and leave their instrument with their families in the
main Gypsy band, which they join at an appointed time and place.
Then there is a grand feast and picnic for two and three weeks. The
different members assemble from all over the country, perhaps. Twenty
years ago a secluded spot in the mountains near Nyack on the Hudson
w~ a favorite rendezvous. At night the whole meadow and piece of
woods, so~e fourteen acres, was ablaze with their camp-fires. They
had a dancmg-platform; and the dark-skinned Rumanian beauties and
stalwart rakle danced to their hearts' content to the sound of the fiddle
ko~za, and bagpipe. Twelve or fifteen bears were chained to the neigh~
bormg trees. All were dressed in their richest and most aaudy costumes
':ith a profus~on of gold ornaments. Even the men wor~ large gold ear~
rmgs. Sometimes as many as forty or fifty large vans were there with a
hundred sleek, well-kept good horses.
Last summer a similar band rendezvoused at Dedham, Mass. Two
wagon-~oads of th:se Gyp ies drove through Allston on their way to a
Somerville abattmr, where they bought four live sheep. These they
r?asted whole at a barbecue, at which they claimed two hundred GypSies were present. For several weeks they were there, and the newspapers were filled with long accounts of their doings. One woman complained to the police that her husband had stolen two hundred dollars
from her. The police search d the camp, and in one wagon found fifty
thousand dollars in gold coin. Everybody went out to see Gypsies who
had so much money, and naturally they had their fortunes told. Two
colored children were working for the Gypsies. Some relative claimed
them. The police were called in, and a long account appeared in the
papers. Later on the same two children were still found with part of
the band near Providence, R. I., and another relative complained to the
police there. How quickly these wild Rumanian Gypsies learn the advantages of newspaper advertising ! And at the barbecue were heard the
same Gypsy instruments and the same Gypsy music .
In many parts of the South imilar bands often give shows and play
these same instru ments. The arne band uses only one or two of them,
but every instrument is occasionally seen.
Gypsies are much more common in most countries of Europe than in
America, and therefore also the instruments. They are the popular
musicians in the Western Orient and Southeastern Europe, continually
travelli~g back and forth over the whole region. This has been theca e
for many centuries. In an article on" Gypsy and Oriental Music" published in the January-March number in 1907, the relations of Gypsies
to the music of various countries was discussed.
Gypsy and Oriental Musical .Instruments.
207
This hasty general sketch is given as a brief introduction to a more
particular consideration of the instruments separately.
I.
THE TZIMBAL.
The Tzimbal, for the last fifty years at least, has been used almost
exclusively by Gypsies, and can fairly be called a characteristic Gypsy
instrument. In Hungary it is a "prima-donna" instrument, often
playing the melody as well as the first violin. At all times it has a most
important role, and plays an accompanying melody of its own as well as
a general accompaniment to the violin. The two little hammers move
over the many wires with such marvellous rapidity and dexterity as to
take the place of several instruments in an ordinary orchestra. There
are no dampers for the strings, as on a pianoforte; therefore they keep
vibrating. One chord runs into another, but the skill of the performer
avoids all discord. The music is ringing, harmonious, and has a peculiar
weird, fascinating effect on the hearer. It is also a prima-donna Gypsy
instrument in Rumania and the whole Balkan Peninsula.
In Russia it is much used, but mostly by the wandering Gypsies. The
settled Gypsies, who comprise the favorite Gypsy choruses, generally
have a guitar for accompaniment. They play it in Sweden, Norway,
Germany, Finland, Poland, Bohemia, Switzerland, Italy, all parts of
Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, Spain, England.
For several centurie , and up to about a century ago, the Dulcimer, a
similar stringed instrument, was popular, and was used in many of the
above-named countries as well as somewhat in America. To-day it is
played by old people at J ewish weddings in many parts of Poland. These
dulcimers are old instruments, generally showing signs of many repairs.
The dulcimer i strung differently from the Gypsy tzimbal, and is considered by instrument-makers as a different instrument. Still in one
vital respect both are the same : the wires are struck by two hammers.
Our pianofortes have been developed from the dulcimer.
In Persia the tzimbal is the prima-donna instrument played by the
leader of the Gypsy orchestra there, and is used almost exclusively by
Gypsies.
In the Erzerum district of Armenia the common people often make a
rude kind of tzimbal themselves, and play it, while everywhere in the
rest of Asiatic Turkey as well as in Egypt it is rare, and generally only
used by foreign Gypsies.
Except as above, no one now plays a tzimbal or dulcimer anywhere
in the world where Gypsies are found. Occasionally they may be played as
curiosities or in theatres, and sometimes as children's toys.
The Oliver Ditson Company, Boston, inform me that they have only
one dulcimer in stock, and that they have not sold any for ten years.
There is no call for them. They never had a tzimbal.
208
. There are historic~! records showing :hat the tzimbal has been played
m H.ung~ry by G yps1es for :nany centunes. "Mahillon' s. Catalogue" (of
musical mstruments), vol. 1, p. 374, states that the tzimbal type is of
quite recent origin in W estern Europe, and is now very rare. On p. 8S it
says, "It is only from the Orient that Europe, about the time of the
Crusades, borrowed the instrument-type of the tzimbal, dulcimer, and
psaltery."
Before this period there is no record of these instruments a'3 existing
in Europe, either in books or by pictorial representations of any kind.
Indee~, the tzimbal seems ~o be later than the psaltery. There are representatiOns of the psaltery m church porches, choirs, and some manuscripts earlier than any of the tzimbal type. The psaltery is picked; the
tzimbal struck with little hammers.
During the Crusades, A. D. 1096 to 1291, millions of people were continually passing to and fro between all parts of Europe and the Orient.
They were of all cl~ ses, - rich and poor; nobles, the educated, and the
ignorant; the good, the bad, and degraded. There were crowds of campfollowers, men and women, to minister to the wants, the necessities, the
pleasures, of the motley crowds. At that time it is known from history
that there were thousands of Gypsies in Persia, one of whose principal
trades was Music and the Dance. There must have been thousands in
Asiatic Turkey, and some in Europe. Would such people not naturally
follow along with these Crusader bands? Somebody at that period with
the Crusaders brought back several types of musical instruments into
Europe.
In Mahillon we read, "It is generally supposed that the lute was
introduced into Europe at the time of the Crusades" (vol. i, p. 479);
"The psaltery was imported into the Occident at the epoch of the Crusades" (p. 82); "Neither the Greeks nor Romans had any instruments
of the lute, guitar, or mandolin type" (p. 83) ; "The vertical flute is
unknown in our countries, but is popular in Persia and Arabia" (p. 48).
I find it is perhaps the most common and popular instrument among
the peasants .of Bessarabia, Volhyn ia, and some other neighboring districts. They make it themselves out of reeds, and some perform most
beautifully on it. I ndeed, a Russian storekeeper was so impressed by this
music, he told me, "They played it so sweetly as to make that store
counter weep," pointing to it. It is also there a favorite Gypsy instrument. Who would be more likely to introduce it than the Gypsies? It
is a very difficult instrument to learn to play. The Kurdish shepherds,
who use it a good deal, learn first on a kind of flageolet. In Persian it is
called nai, ne (~u ~).
"The z~mr, still employed· in Moslem countries, is, except in some
insignificant details, exactly like the' schalmey' of Virdung, A. D. 1510. 1
1
Gypsy and Oriental Mus£cal Instruments.
J'ournal o.f A merz'can Folk-Lore.
Persian, surn~i, zurnifi (~U),-
l.?.u),));
Arab, zemr ~)); Armenian, zurna.
209
The Crusades, which cattered over western Europe so many products
of Oriental civilization, probably brought to us also the ancestor of the
hautbois (oboe)" (p. 228).
This is a fa vorite Gypsy instrument in the East. Often I have heard
Arabs speak of it almost as if peculiar to them. Still it is by no means
confined to Gypsies there. One thing, however, should always be borne
in mind. Music is now, and from the earliest times has been, considered
dishonorable as a public profession. The z~mr is a loud, piercing instrument, hardly adapted for home use, and naturally is played most by
public musicians, most of whom certainly are Gypsies.
This same oboe is a very common Gypsy instrument all through Southeastern Europe, and is seldom used by others, except in military bands
and orchestras. It is a Gypsy instrument there, and indeed all over the
world.
It is to be noticed that it is now one of the most popular and common
instruments among the country people in central and southern Italy,
where the largest size is called a piffero; a smaller, ciaramella; and a still
smaller, and shriller, a pippizzera.
"The jew's-harp [Mahillon, vol. i, p. 102] is very ancient, and spread
all over Asia, where it originated. In our days it is not less known in
Europe." Curiously, the Gypsies in Egypt make and sell a great many
jew's-harps. They also do so elsewhere, as in central and southern Italv.
Here, however, it is now made and used by everybody as perhaps o~e
of th~ most common instruments among the peasantry (called spdssa
pensieri).
It is not generally known how recently most instruments have been
introduced in our military bands. ln the seventeenth century the infantry
bands had only fifes and drums; and the cavalry, trumpets and kettledrums. It was only about the middle of the eighteenth century that the
other instruments began to be used, and many of these were copied from
the East then. (See Mahillon, vol. ii, p. 188.)
These citations from as good authority as exists show that the tzimbal
probably came from Asia at the time of, or since, the Crusades. It is a
fact that the violin was developed from the Moorish r~bab; the mandolin
and ,guitar, from the Arab 'lid (l.)r); the psaltery, from the kandn
qanun (\.:J~u), -all brought into Spain by the Arabs in the eighth century; but it seems probable that all these instruments also entered Europe
directly from the East about the period of the Crusades. Many things
point to this conclusion. There is no evidence that the tzimbal came
through Spain. It apparently came the other way. All monumental and
pictorial representations of instruments in Western Europe before A. D.
1300 have these other instruments, but no tzimbal.
\iVithin the last ten or fifteen years the comparatively rude-looking but
effective Gypsytzimbal has been developed in Hungary into an elaborate
VOL. XXJ. -
NO S.
8 I -82 .
14
210
J'ournal of A merzcan Folk-Lore.
Gypsy and Oriental Musz'cal Instruments.
elegant instrument. This now to a large extent takes th
f
.
1
in H unganan
·
homes. I t h as b ecome the national He p ace. o a. piano
ment, and it is fashionable to play it. They call it a a ~ng:r;an '~(stru­
nounced "tzimbalom ") . A weekly paper called ''Thcztcm .a obml .Pr~­
.
e ztm a om" IS
Issued, devoted to the instrument. There are two or thr
f
£
it at the Conservatory of Music, Budapest. In 1906 an m·ete pro. ess~rHs .0
to
f th c ·
1 -T · b l]"
erestmg
tsry o
e ztmba om I ~1m a
(1oo pages, 8vo) was ublished b
N. Joszef Schunda, a Ieadmg manufacturer of musical · ptr
t .Y
1
Budapest. The fact stated, that he has sold ten thousa di~s. u:~n s ~
the prices for some, several hundred dollars shows the~ t ztmt ta k' a~
this old instrument.
'
m eres a en m
The word "tzimbal" is from the Greek ~<vJJ-f3aA.ov ( kimbalon) ; Latin,
cymbalum or cymbalon; hence the German spelling Cymbal, but spoken
tdmbal. Gypsies call it tzimbal.
The term is probably applied to it from its clear, loud ringing sound,
like that of cymbals.
In short, the tzimbal is an ancient Oriental instrument, now characteristic of the Gypsies in the Orient and Europe, and used almost exclusively
by them. It was unknown in Western Europe before the fourteenth or
fifteenth centuries. Soon after, the dulcimer began to be played, and
one or two centuries ago it was popular in England, Germany, France,
and other parts of Europe. It now has fallen almost entirely into disuse.
The tzimbal is one of the oldest instruments known 0
· d · d
·
A
·
.
· ne IS cptcte
on
an
ancient
ssvnan
bas-relief,
and
it
was
a
commo
.
., .
.
n an d favon'te
Instrument of the ancient Assynans.
The Hebrews had it. Some think the Hebrew nebel
d 1·
oth
th t ·
h
.
was a u cimer;
ers, a It wast e psanterm mentioned in Daniel. This word would
seem ...to be the same as that now used in Syria for the tzimbal, santtr
~).
It Js
G k x t-
the sa..me as the Persian word santdr and th
d
x t- .,
,
e mo ern
ree. sun or,, sun onn, santur (uaJ!Twp), the ancient Greek psalterion,
Tur~sh santur ~#~). Persians use several forms,- santtir, zantdr,
santur, the root of whtch (zan) means "to ring," to "sound."
b The. rocks on the mountains near Kermanshah are decorated with
p as-~eliefs m~d~ by the Persian King Khozru in the sixth century. A
ers1an santur IS there depicted.
T~ere are other .very old representations of the Persian tzimbal. It is
not . no~n what. kind of an instrument the celebrated Sambuca of the
.
.
caphvatmg Lydian da
C . 1
.
ncers was.
unous y Prretorms giVes, as one
~:~~ f~r ~he tztmbal: sambuca. The tzimbal is seen in India, and is
a k~anun, an Arabic word for a psaltery. The Chinese have it the
Yf ng Iznd~ buit t?e Chinese themselves, and their books, say that it ~arne
rom n Ia. t Is seen also . B
h
d
.
.
m urma , an sometimes m Japan.
I
nstru~ents made with strips of wood, and struck with two sticks are
~~~mtohn m m~nybpa.rts ?f the world. Our xylophone is of this type. One
' e manm a ' Is Widespre a d an d exceed'mgIy popu Iar m
. many parts
of Africa.
The Cuban negroes ha b
h .
· b b .
ve roug t With them not only a knowledge of
the
manm a, ut Its name I C b h
instruments in a d f . . n . u a t ey very commonly make such
bola.
ru e ashton, which they call, in their Spanish, marfmIn Russia, Polanct B h · H
usual and popular ' . o. emta,
ungary, Rumania, Germany, the
The G
h kb name Is. everywhere a word pronounced tzfmbal
erman ac rett hackeb tt ·
·
Colocci (" Gli Zingar· :,
re ' IS pr~~er1~ applied to the dulcimer.
. I, p. 29I) calls It zl czmballo" (the tzimbal) In
F
h d 1.
rene a u cimer 1s tympanon.
·
II.
211
PAN'S PIPE, KOBZA, AND VERTICAL FLUTE.
The Rumanian Gypsies use the Pan's pipe as a prima-donna instrument, playing the same notes as the first violin. It is peculiar to the
Gypsies in Rumania and some neighboring districts north and east. It
is often made in the form of a curve, to move more easily under the
mouth. They call it muskiil, which is the Rumanian word muscalu
(pronounced muskdl), meaning" a whistle." In their orchestras here the
muskdl very often takes the place of the tzimbal. The two are never used
together. The Hungarian Gypsies do not play the musk[I.
The skill with which they perform on the Pan's pipe is surprising,now soft, low, sweet, and now loud, penetrating, and yet most agreeable.
Several accomplished musicians who have often heard them assert that
they play superbly, and produce most beautiful and wonderful musical
effects, which cannot be equalled by the :flutists of the best orchestras in
Europe. There is something particularly sweet, rich, and attractive
about the music of the vertical flute when skiJfully played, but it is very
difficult to play. The Pan's pipe is simply from seven to twenty vertical
flutes of different lengths fastened together in a row, or curve, and closed
at the lower end.
The Pan's pipe is tuned by Rumanian Gypsies before every piece
played by dropping from one to four peas into the proper pipes, thus
sharping or flatting them. They know the notes required, and have very
nice ears for time and tune; also they can vary the tone by their method
of blowing.
Mahillon (vol. iii, p. 409; vol. i, p. 47) adds that these Lautari also
change the pitch by inserting wax in a pipe.
This method of tuning explains the ancient Peruvian stone Pan's pipe,
whose impossible scale has puzzled archreologists. Indeed, it bears evidence that it was so tuned.
Bancroft ("Native Races of the Pacific," vol. iv, p. 19) mentions this
very method of tuning them by the Indians.
Although the Pan's pipe is or has been found in nearly all parts of the
2!2
,_.
:Journal of A merz"can Folk-Lore.
world, at present its use in Europe, Asia, Northern Africa, and America
is almost entirely confined to these Gypsies of the Rumanian district.
These are seen all over Europe, particularly in some parts of Germany
and occasionally even now in America. They have a Pan's pipe fastened
to _their ears, turn a hurdy-gurdy, and beat a drum on the back by
strmgs fastened to the foot . Above the drum is a triangle, and cymbals
played al o by the feet. I have seen them here also, playing the Pan's
pipe alone.
Jn central and southern Italy very many of the boys make rude Pan 's
pipes themselves of reeds and call them Fischietti ("whistles"). So
some of the peasants use it, one popular name being zampogna.
Mahillon (vol. ii, p. 331) states, "The villagers near Milan during the
carnival sometimes make up bands of fifteen or twenty people, who play
Pan's pipes, a big drum, and the cymbals."
Soi:ne fifty years ago it was attempted to form such bands in England.
The shepherds of the Pyrenees and Madrid scissors-grinders occasionally use a sort of Pan's pipe. They are mentioned by Spanish poets as
zampoiia. The Oliver Ditson Company do not sell more than one in ten
years. They are made still in Berlin, now of metal, as more durable than
the old bamboo style. Some of these are sold in Naples. But, except as
above stated, the Pan's pipe in Europe and America is used onlv in
theatres and as a toy or curiosity. "During the middle ages in Eu~ope
it enjoyed great favor, but now it is confined to the wandering musicians" (Mahillon, v.ol. i, p. 47). Mahillon excepts Rumania, and mentions the curious fact that there it is called N iii, as well as M uscalu.
N iii is the Persian word for a vertical flute, and is so used also by the
Arabs . This word came from the Orient. It seems, however, likely that
Gypsy influence has made itself deeply felt in Rumania, for the national Rumanian air, " The Do ina," is Gypsy music, many Rumanians
state.
In China and J apan, Pan's pipes are seen, but are not common. The
Phan (pronounced Pan 1) of Siam is a Pan's pipe. Shakespear, Hind.
Dictionary, gives MiisiJiir 0~,-.o) as a Pan's pipe used by dervishes
and shepherds, but it is rare in India.
·
It is very seldom seen in Egypt or Asiatic Turkey. Most natives in
those countries have never seen one, and know no name for it. As to
Persia, Colocci (p. 291) says, "In r8ro, when the brother of the Shah
of Persia returned from Paris, he passed through Rumania, and heard
some Gypsies play t~e Pan's pipe (za nzpogna), and acknowledged they
surpassed the P rs1ans themselves, the r cognized masters of this
instrument."
·
Dr. E. ~- v. Horn hostel, ~ho for years has studied Pan's pipes, has
recently wnttcn an account of those in the Berlin Museum from SiidNeu-Mecklenburg, discussing those of Java, Siam, etc., and the music.
Gypsy and Oriental A1usical Instruments.
2!3
His article well illustrates the use of this instrument in the Farther
East.
The British Museum has an ancient Peruvian Syrinx called huayrapuhu-ra. It was also known in ancient Mexico.
As a very ancient in trument, the Pan's pipe (cn)ptv~, cn1ptyyo'>), is mentioned in Homer (Iliad, ro, 13). How much it was used by the ancient
Greeks and Romans does not seem cl ar. According to Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, p. ro88, "It was the appropriate
mugical instrument of the Arcadian and other Greek shepherds. When
the Roman poets had occasion to mention it, they called it fistula and
also, from the material of which it was made, arundo, calamus (reed), or
cicuta (hemlock). Sometimes the pipes were in a curve." A Rumanian
dictionary, under Chimp6i (Pan's pipe), gives Latin gingrina, calamus,
arundo, cicuta, fistula.
The Lydians used it for military music (Herod. i, r7). A Pan's pipe
with bellows two thousand years old was found at Tarsus. Representations of it from the sixth century are found on the rock sculptures near
Kermanshah, Persia.
As to the origin of it, the ancient folk-lore myth is this: The god Pan
became enamored with the nymph Syringa. She evaded him, and
finally was changed into reeds. The disconsolate Pan still followed her,
and made of the reeds the syrinx (Italian, siringa; French, Flflte de Pan;
German, Panpfeife) . The modern Greek name is the same as the ancient, syrinx, and also the popular word syringa (uvptyya). There are
numerous illustrations of the Pan's pipe from the ninth to the fourteenth centuries, and it is shown also in sculptures on cathedral porches
and choirs in Spain, Rouen, Exeter. It was a favori te instrument of the
wandering French and other minstrels.
Briefly, the Pan's pipe in Europe seems always to have been the instrument of shepherd , wandering minstrels, and Gypsies; and to-day its
use is almost confined to the Gypsies in or near Rumania. There one
word for it is Nai. The Gypsies in parts of southeastern Europe also use
surnat (zurn&) for their oboe. The u e of this instrument there is nearly
exclusively by Gypsies. Both words are Persian, and from it used in.
Turkish.
A Gypsy orchestra often consists of one or two first violins, a viola, violoncello, a contra-bass, a Pan's pipe, and from one to three kobzas of different size . The kobza is another instrument not used by Hungarian
Gypsies. It i the Arab lute, and from it the Rumanian Gypsy mu icians
derive their name, Ltiuta?'i (sing. Ldutar). The Arabic al'Ud becomes in
Turkish
(~,~),whence the Gypsies obtain another word for
their kobza. Hungarian Gypsies, as they have no kobza, often call a
violin Lii·vutii. Exactly the same kobza is played by European Gypsies
who wander over to Smyrna and the northern coasts of Asia Minor.
z!i!'t, t'avflt
214
7ournal o.f A mer£ca1z Folk-Lore.
It is well known to the people there, who style it the Bulgiirt. Another
curious fact about thi word is that one "\ ord for bagpipe in Poland is
kobza. Many Poles, I find, ar familiar with it, and it is given as the only
word for "bagpipe" in two Poll h po ket dictionaries. Engel (p. 124)
uses this language: "It i remarkable that in the most northern countries of Europe musical instruments are to be fOtmd which, from their
carved ornamentation as well as from certain peculiarities in their construction, strongly point to Western Asia as their original home. The
Icelandic fidla might well be mistaken for a large Arab rehab."
Arab and Turkish Gypsie for centuries have visited Norway and
Sweden with their instruments, giving acrobatic shows with music, inging, and dancing. Hence people call them Tiitiire. Fifteen years ago
every summer se ral such bands were accustomed to take the teamers
bound for theN orth Cape. They landed at Yarious towns along the coast,
and were taken up again on the return trip. So in Sweden I have many
accounts of the same Arab Gypsie , who were tattooed, and who off red
to and did tattoo some of the Swedi h lads. The tattooing bowed that
they were Arabs. Did any such Gypsies at som time leave some of their
instruments b hind, perhaps afterward copied?
Many of these bands were flourishing and had elegantly made in truments. They amuse and entertain the country people there, have pl nty
of money, and are looked upon quite differently from the common poor,
degraded, suspected Swedish Gypsy.
The Norwegian steamer captain always carried them free, as they
entertained the passenger , the cr w, and himself. They played instruments of the fiddle, lute, and flute type , bagpipes, tambourines, castanets. Here we ha e a clear instance of all the e coming into Europe for
centurie through Turkey, and not pain. The Russian Gud6k ("peasant'. fiddle' ) is very old, and its form shows that it did not originate in
Western Europe.
Some Gypsies in Syria are famous for their skill on the vertical flute
(Arab, shabbiibah [ K.?~
J, al o menjdira) .
The exquisite performances
on the same (qaviil [Jf~], Turk.) by the Mevlevi de:vi hes ~re always
admired. The Kurdish shepherds play it (Kurd., belur). It IS made of
English walnut (gds) wood; and they rub it with butter and place it in
the sun, when it becomes a light pretty red. Another mailer in diameter,
but longer, is called shamshdt, and is put in a wooden case when not in
use, it is so fragile; this produces soft rand sweeter music even than the
bel1ir. They learn first on a viHk, a kind of flageolet.
A popular Kurdi h folk-lore story illustrates the reputation of its
music. There was once a poor sh pherd who watched the flocks of a
very rich Kurd. He had thousand of beep, goats, cattle, and horses,
and could at any moment lace a thousand retainers in the field to punish
Gypsy and Oriental Musz'cal Instruments.
215
an enemy or on a marauding expedition. He had a beautiful daughter
who fell in love with the poor hepherd and the sweet music of his beldr,
, and he reciprocated her affection. She begged her father to allovv them
to marry. For a long time he was obdurate. At last to her incessant
pleading, for all Kurds are devoted to their children, he said this : "If he
can keep his flock of five hundred sheep from drinking at the spring for
three days, you shall marry him." The shepherd watched them day and
night. Whenever they approached the spring he played his sweetest airs
on his beldr. The sheep know this music is their call. They love it. So
as he walked away from the spring each time playing, they always followed him. At the expiration of the three days, no sheep had touched
the water of the spring. So he won his Kurdish beauty. They were married, and he and his descendants have always been noted as the best
performers on the bel?ir, the sweetest of instruments.
The popular word for it in Russia, Poland, Bohemia, is dudka, sometimes sviry?it. The word is fluyera in Moravia, Rumania, Bessarabia,
which is also applied to the oboe. In Greece the Vallach shepherds play
it and a short oboe. Both are called jloira. The same vertical flute is
known to a few in Italy under the name flduerii.
All these vertical flutes are sub tantially the arne. They vary in
length from one to four feet; in diameter, from half an inch to an inch
and a half. The blown end is sometimes cut square across, ometimes
bevelled. The beliir is often cut square, but rounded to a thin edge.
Gypsies play them everywhere, but they are now one of the mo t common instruments for everybody where they are found, in the Western
Orient and Southeastern Europe. Often the word duduk is used for
them in European Turkey and Northern Asia Minor.
III.
THE BAGPIPE.
The Highland Bagpipe (Pip-mar, Fib-var, [Piob mhor]) is the
national instrument of Scotland. There is perhaps no instrument of
which a people are so fond and of which they are so proud as the
Scotch of their Pipes. It was the ear of a Scotch woman who fir t
detected the "Relief of L ucknow," and cried, "Dinna ye hear the
Slogan?" The Scotch regiments in all parts of the British Empire have
their bagpipe bands, often consisting of forty or fifty pipers. Wherever
Scotchmen are found, there you will hear their bagpipe. At the annual
Scotch dinner of St. Andrew's in Mexico, at every Scotch festival and
picnic in the United States, and everywhere, we find the Pipes. The
famous bagpipe band plays every day in the Gardens at Edinburgh; and
they look so smart in their bonnets and kilts, and tep off so jauntily, that
it puts everybody in good spirits to see and hear them. There is no
music more enlivening than the bagpipe. It is often spoken of as rough,
harsh, savage-like music. That may be true, but no music appeals more
7ournal of Amerzcan Folk-Lore.
Gypsy and Or£entat Mus£cal Instruments.
strongly to the common ~eople. W~en introduced as new in any country,
as Egypt, ~oroc~o, I~d1a, t~e na~1ves take to it "immensely."
So the Insh mala-p1pa (~ala pwb) and the piper, pipara (piobaire),
have always been popular m Ireland.
The Welsh never played or liked the bagpipe, although one early
Welsh king attempted to introduce it from Ireland when he returned
from his exile there.
One form, the biniou (pl. of benvek, "instrument," Breton) was very
popular in Brittany. Another, the musette, like the Irisli union pipe
inflated by a bellows worked under the right arm, was an elegant instrument played before royalty by a court piper about the seventeenth century. The chalumeau is common in Savoie. These Savoyard pipers
wander over France, are often in England, and have been met with even
in Cairo. In Rousillon and the Pyrenees district the cornetn.use was the
instrument for the dance, just as it i in Galicia, Asturias, and the Basque
Provinces, Spain. o E nglishman plays a bagpipe unless perhaps on the
Scottish border. It is found also in the Auvergne Mountains.
It appears, then, that it is used in Great Britain, France, and Spain,
where the Keltic influence is still most felt, perhaps.
For this reason many suppose the bagpipe was evolved independently
by and from the Keltic brain. For one who has a Scotch name and a
Scotch ancestry, it i hard to believe that this is not true. We know it
must be the fact that other instruments, as the Pan's pipe, must have
been invented in various parts of the world by different races.
To study an in trument, it is not enough to know it is found in a
~ountry: we must learn how common it is, who plays it, in what parts it
IS found, and whence it came. For example, every American child ten
years o!d is perfectly familiar with the bagpipe. He has often een it and
heard It played, and knows its name. It is often heard in Mexico, in
~very one ~f the United States, and in Canada; yet it would be misleadmg to call1t an American in trument. No American ever plays it. It is
only used here by fou r cla es - Scotchmen and their children born
here, Irish bagpiper , Italian bagpipers, and Gypsy bear-leaders from
Southeastern Europe and Syria.
In ma?y Canadian cities, as Montreal, Toronto, Hamilton, there are
large reg~mental ~ag~ipe bands. Cape Breton, Prince Edward's I land,
a~d some other di tncts, have large populations descendants of Scotch
Hlgh!anders. Many of these even now speak onl~ Gaelic. In these parts
bagptpes are exceedingly common. o all over Canada and the United
Statec:: ' in Iaro-e
cities , are foun d many Scotchmen and the1r
. ptpers.
.
o
In ·Boston are perhaps t wen t y. I n· h p1pers
.
.
..
were seen m many c1t1es
b ut are largely di ap
·
I
B
.
.
.
·
peanng. n o ton and VICimty now there can'
hardly be more than three or four. I ta11an
.
. b agptpers
are more numerous, and there are ertainly ten here who tra el about playing wh n out of
other work. Two or three do nothing except perform on the bagpipe
(zampogna), and they are Gypsie .
.
.
Then in Canada bear-leaders very commonly pia~ th.elr bagptp s,
as they find them popular in the Scotch districts; wh1le m the Umted
States they find it an incumbrance rather than a benefit. o they of.ten
leave it with the main band, and play some smaller instrument, or Simply sing to their bears.
The bagpipe was never an aboriginal American Indian i.nstrument.
Wallaschek cites one authority to the contrary, as to one tnbe of ~ew
Mexican Indians, the Keres. But Mr. Stewart Culin, who was collectl~g
for several months among this and neighboring tribes, made speCial
inquiries for me. He could not learn that the bagpipe i now or ever
had been, used there. All asserted the reverse.
So as to Europe, Asia, and Africa, the fact that a bagpipe is sometimes or often found in a country, is not sufficient. We must learn particulars, and such are very scanty, from publications, except as to Great
Britain. On seeing two or three bagpipes from Egypt in a museum, one
would suppose they were common th re. The fact is, they are very rare.
I could never find a native who ever saw or heard of one. Very few even
know any Arab word for it. Artin Pasha, Cairo, the Secretary of Education, writes me, "I never heard of one in Egypt, although he frequently saw them in Con. tantinople when a boy; Mr. Findlay, H.
M. Acting Agent, says, 'Tell Mr. Sinclair the Cameron Highlanders
introduced the bagpipe into Egypt.'" Artin Pasha ha lived there fortyfive years, and" knows more about such out-of-the-way matters than any
man in Egypt. The negro regiment now have their bagpipe bands, and
take to it immensely. They play it to the satisfaction of the natives, better
than the Highlanders themselves; that i , more savagely, with more go."
General MacLean has also introduced the bagpipe in the army of the
Sultan of Morocco, and the native band and soldiers enjoy it" wonderfully."
In central and southern Italy, icily, and Sardinia the bagpipe is a
common and popular instrument among the pea antry in the country
districts. They make these themselves, and generally call it zampogna, or
sampogna. Ciaramella (dialectic in the M essina district, ciaranzedda)
is another common name, which more properly means a mall piffero.
Scoppina is u ed in the Rome province; and surdelina, cornarnusa, and
piva are liter~ry word eld~m even known to the common people. Some
Italian bagp1pers are Gyps1e .
There is, however, a very numerous class of bagpiper. seen all over
Europe. They are Gypsies from Southeastern Europe and Syria. They
are seen in England, quite common in France, very frequ en tly found in
Germany, less frequently in Norway, weden, Finland. In Germany
they are generally perhaps recognized as Gyp. ies, and called by the word
216
217
7ournal oj A mer£can Folk-Lore.
Gypsy and Oriental Mus£cal Instruments.
"Hungarians," used in an indefinite sense, and meaning people from the
Lower Danube region. No German, Pole, Bohemian, Scandinavian,
Finn, Russian, Austrian, Swiss, Tiroler, Hungarian, Rumanian, Greek,
plays the bagpipe unless he is a Gyp y. This is almost the universal testimony of a very large number of natives in these countries, and such has
been my own experience. Sometimes I have questioned fifty persons in
a day. A few only have said that some Hungarian, Rumanian, Volhynian, and Bessarabian shepherds use it. Almost every one has
asserted the contrary stoutly. Those most interested in the subject and
the musicians, Gypsies as well as others, who should know the most
about it, deny such use.
So in Bulgaria, Rumelia, Macedonia, it is a most popular instrument
for the dance, weddings, feasts, and is played, mostly at least, by Gypsies.
The Gypsy piper furnishes favorite dance music in Servia and Croatia.
In Greece several times a year Gypsy bagpipers come round, sometimes
two or three together, and are styled Bulgdri. People in Constantinople
call them Boinik. The ordinary word for a bagpipe in Turkey is gaida,
ghaida (zs~~), a Greek word, or the Turkish word tultim. Gaida is the
word in Bulgaria, Servia, Croatia, and is frequently used for it by Polish,
Bohemian, and Lithuanian authors and poets. The Turkish word
ghtiida (raida, Parisian r about) is its name in Tunis. See a recent article by Dr. E . M . von Hornbostel, "Phonographierte tunesische Melodien," p. 4· It contains an account of a band from Tunis, bagpipe,
etc., which appeared to be Gypsy.
Gaita is the only Spanish word, and is used also in Cuba, where
Spaniards from Galicia, Asturias, the Basques very often play the bagpipe for their dances.
It is often seen in Syria, particularly played by the bear-leaders.
The "New York Tribune" of July 8, I 906, contains a picture of "A
Travelling Circus in Palestine." One of the men holds the bear and his
pole. Another plays a bagpipe, and a third a tambourine. It is the same
light yellow Syrian bear with a stiff mane between the shoulders, the
same chain and muzzle, the same bagpipe and tambourine, and the same
;
men, seen all over America and Europe.
The Syrian name for a bagpipe is 'anafz ~), also m~jw~z), more
properly applied to the double reed pipe.
How does it happen that this word gaidais used for the bagpipe in all these
countries? Did the Gypsies take the word and instrument with them?
The Armenian words for bagpipe are dig and dkjtir (dukjar) the
Rumanian word, ch-umpiii. The European Gypsies say duda, gaida, and
several made-up descriptive words.
Many Polish poets have written charming little poems on these Gypsy
bagpipers, as "The Old Dudarz."
When the Czar of Russia degraded the Archbishop of Novgorod in
I569, he said, "The worthy father was fitter for a bagpiper leaning a
dancing bear than a prelate." Paspati (p. 238) mentions the fact that the
word gaida ("bagpipe") is often found in Gypsy songs.
Manson ("The Highland Bagpipe," p. 65) says, "The bagpipe and
short oboe seem to have been intimately associated with the wandering
minstrels of Germany from time immemorial;" and on p. 38, "At the
end of the thirteenth century in France it was used only by the lower
classes, the blind, and the wandering musicians."
About the seventeenth century it and the Gypsy dancers were very
popular. Poets sang the praises of "La belle Bohemienne."
In A. D. I307 in England a payment was made to Janno, a bagpiper,
for playing before the king. "J anno" is plainly the Slavic or Hungarian
word for "John." J em my Allen, the celebrated Northumberland bagpiper (I734-I8Io), was a Gypsy. His life has been written, and his
exploits heralded in no end of folk-lore stories and songs. Many of the
Scotch Highland pipers have been Gypsies. One of the colored postal
cards now circulating contains a representation of "the Highland Gypsy
bagpiper." Naumann ("Music," p. 26o) states, "The popular instruments of the itinerant musicians during the middle ages were the bagpipe and short oboe."
The bagpipe was the devil's instrument, and that of sorcerers. Durer
so pictured it, and Burns so described it. The Gypsies are rat-catchers.
The Pied Piper of Hamelin played either a bagpipe or shalmey (oboe).
The myth has two versions.
In the summer of I907 a Gypsy bagpiper, with his yellow Syrian bear
and Syrian bagpipe, was seen in Farnham, Canada. Formerly many
passed through every year and amused the people. This bear frightened
a horse, which ran away. The poor Gypsy was arrested and driven out
of town, and none have been seen there since. Mrs. Bishop speaks of
seeing these Arab bagpipers among the Bakhtiari Kurds. I have
accounts of them in California, Utah, Winnipeg, Man., Mobile, Ala.,
Savannah, Ga., Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, etc., as well as in
nearly every country in Europe.
Chambers, a Scotch Encyclopredia, under "Pibroch," states: "The
earliest mention of a bagpipe as Scotch military music is at the battle
of Balrennes, I 594, and before that time it can hardly be considered as
the national instrument of Scotland." It intimates that in I4II there was
no bagpipe there. Manson (p. 53) says, "The first authentic reference
to it is in 1406." There are references to bagpipers in Ireland and England even two centuries before. The harp, however, was formerly the
national instrument of Scotland, as always of Ireland and Wales.
The bagpipe is an old instrument in the East, and probably the same
as that mentioned in Daniel iii, 5, Io, IS. It is now common in Azerbaijan, Persia. It was known to the Greeks and Romans. A coin of
218
219
:Journal of Amer-ican Folk-Lore.
Gypsy a'n d O,riental Mus£cal Instruments.
Nero's time represents him as playing on a bagpipe. No Greek or Latin
words for it are found in ancient authors, although the piper is mentioned.
It could hardly have been a common instrument in A. D. so in Greece or
Rome. The snake-charmer and jugglers of India and Ceylon now use a
rude sort of bagpipe very similar in form to that of the oldest Roman
bagpipe. It is used also by some hill tribes in India, but is not often seen
there. Some of the Indian native regiments now have their bagpipers.
The usual Hungarian word for "bagpipe" is duda, and for the piper,
dudas (dudash). T his is also the Gypsy word there. Sometimes they also
say gaida:. In Polish and Bohemian the most common word is duda, or
the plural, dudy ; for a smaller one, the diminutive dudka (pl. dudky),
wJJ.ich is the Russian word. In Bessarabia the Russian word is volynka
(vaUnka).
We find Lithuanian duda; Lettish duda; Wend duda; Croat. dude,
gaijde; Servian duda, gajda; Slovak, dudy, gaydy; Slovenian duda, gajda;
Polish duda, gajda, dudy, dudka; Bohemian dudy, kejda, gaidy; Bulgarian gaida; Greek gaida; Turkish gaida; Portuguese gaita; Spanish gaita; France Roussillon gaita. The ordinary spoken word in the
above languages north of Servia is some form of duda. In Germany
the most common word now is Dudelsack; the piper Dudler, also a
w<?rd for" a silly fellow." The Polish and Bohemian Dudy is used in the
same sense for "a simpleton." Dudel is a slang German word for
Du,dler, and is the origin of our word "Doodle," a simple fellow, and
Yankee Doodle: henc our word "dude," a silly fop.
Prretorius (early seventeenth century) uses Dudey for bagpipe, not
Dudelsack. The Century Dictionary gives "Doodlesack" from German
Dudelsack; from Pol. dudy ; Boh. duda, dudy; Slov. dude, a bagpipe,
etc. Scott used the word in "Old Mortality." The Irish word dudara
(dudaire) i a tru mpeter or piper; and slang Irish dudin, a pipe. Perhaps
it is found in the refrain of an old English song," Duda, duda, de," which
are the exact Gypsy words, "bagpi pe give." This word duda is plainly
not of Hungarian, German, or Slavic origin. It is the same as the Turkish word duduk, any kind of pipe, and especially the vertical flute. So in
Russia duda, dudka, is the only word for a vertical flute, and, as we have
seen, is very common there in some districts. This word belongs in the
Balkan Peninsula and the north coast of Asia Minor. Did the Gypsies
take it and the Dudy with them north and west ? There are in all these
countries other words for a bagpipe, but this word is by far the most
commonly used. Linde's Polish L exicon in four large quarto volumes
goes into the use of the word fully.
ment, which originated in the East. The Pan's pipe is old, and in Europe
and the Western Orient used now only by Gypsies in and near Rumania.
Otherwise it is simply a toy or practically a curiosity.
The Bagpipe east of France and Italy is at the present time almost
entirely in the hands of Gyp ie of Southeastern Europe and Syria, who
wander with it all over Europe and America, and take their small Oboe,
Kobza, vertical flute, and other instruments with them ; and this they
have done for many centuries. During the middle ages a similar Gypsylike class of wandering musicians roamed through Europe. Who they
were, history does not inform us by name. Nearly all of these instruments, if not all of them, came from Asia, some since the first Crusade.
Whether the Gypsies brought any of them can only be decided by taking
a broad view of the question after an exhaustive consideration of everything bearing on the subject.
Every one of these instruments merits a long article by itself. It is
impossible here to do more than to throw out hints, and to speak generally of a subject ''which opens an enormous scope in, and a deep insight
into, a neglected chapter of cultural history."
220
IV.
CONCLUSION.
The whole matter can be briefly summed up thus: The Tzimbal is
now played almost exclusively by Gyp ics. It is a very ancient instru-
ALLSTON, MASS.
221
Reprinted from the Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society,
July 1909
6 HOPE PLACE, LIVERPOOL, GREAT BRITAIN
/
V.-THE WORD < ROM'
By
ALBERT THOMAS SINCLAIR
HE Gypsies in Europe and America universally call thetn~elves
Rorn, or Rum. This word, however, is not so used by Gypsies
in Asia, nor in Africa, except by some who have wandered over from
Europe. In Armenia and the Kaukasus some, comparatively few
in numbers, call themselves Dum, Dam, Lam, the same word as
Rom. Gypsiologists haYe taken it for granted that the Roman '
brought this word with them from their original home in the east,
and a volume would hardly contain all that has been written in
endeavouring to trace its origin.
Professor Ferdinand J usti once began a letter to me with these
words: 'Die Folgerungen, welche man aus sprachlichen Beobachtungen fur ethnographischen Yerhaltni se ziehen kann, haben sich
scbon oft a1s unsicher, oder tauschend ergeben, so dass man hier
ehr vorsichtig sein muss. Besonders scheint es mir mi slich, die
Z1geunersprache, fur solche Untersuchungen oder chlusse zu
benutzen, weil die Zigeuner tiberall wo sie gewandert sind ihren
prachschatz bereichert haben, und weil in vielen Failen nicht
.-a
T
2
THE WORD 'ROM'
sogleich deutlich ist, ob ein Wort echt indisch-zigeunerisch, oder
aus einer mit den indischen verwandten arischen, oder indogermanischen prachen entlehnt ist.' This ad monition should be
borne in mind in discu sing the word Rom. One must be cautious
and consider whether it may not have been borrowed on the way,
and never brought from the east. For an important fact has been
generally overlooked. There are to-day in European and Asiatic
:Turkey millions of people, not Gypsies, who call themselves by
this same word, and to whom it is applied by all Arabs, Turks,
Persians, Hindus, and others, and this ha been Lhe ca e for two
thousand years.
The Byzantine Empire, also tyled the East Roman, Eastern,
or Greek Empire, was founded in 395 A.D., and was brought to a
close on May the 29th, 1453, when Mohammed II. captured
Constantinople. During this period the Greeks called themselves
'Romans,' 'PwfLato£ (Lat. R o1nani).1 At first its territory included
Syria, Asia Minor and Pontus, Egypt, Thrace, Moe ia (now Bulgaria), Macedonia, Greece, and Crete, but it varied in ext,ent at
different periods. The whole empire during much of its existence
was rich, populous, and filled with large cities and a pleasureloving people. 2 Among the population were many millions of
Greeks, calling themselves 'Romans.'
Persian and Arabic writers, even Firdusi and Tabari, used Rum
as a general designation for the Byzantine Empire,3 and the word
appears everywhere, not only in large lexicons, but also in
colloquial phrase-books.4
1
By E. A.
Dictionary of Roman and Byzantinf- Greek, 146 B.C. to A.D. 1100.
Sophocles. 1 70. Introduction p. 10.
2 The magnificence of the Greek civilisation in Asia Minor is shown hy the
immense ruius scattered all over the district. In one of the wildest regio11S now
found in Knrd istan, the Bohtan, are seen such r u in s, each several square miles in
extent. In one, houses and a church w~::re dug out of the solid rock in the side of
a mountain. The iuscriptions are Greek, and show themselves to be since the
Christ.au era. One of the ruins is at Hazru, another at Maya Tarkio, or Farkin,
and there are others in the region.
3 See Prof. A . W. Williams J ackson, Zoroaster, pp. 8 , 157, 216.
De Goeje,
Memoire SU1'les mig'rations des 'l'sigane.~ travers l'A8ie , p. 31. Leide, 1903.
a
4
Steingass, P ers.-Eng. Diet., rumi
"" ' , 'Roman, '' Greek, ' ' Turkish'; riimi,
'--:? /...;'
'Greek' ; 1·ftrn tJJ 'Greece'; rurni u zanyi , 'Greek and Ethiopian.'
E ng.- P ers. Diet. (p. 1479), 'a Greek,' yunc£ni
,._, ,
'-:? j\j..Ju
rilmi
vVollaston,
.:-<•);
y ./
'Greece,'
yunan ~\.iy.., 1·um ~ J) ; 'Turkey' (p. 1483), mulk-i-1·um ~J) L!..H...: (land of
Turks); 'a Roman' (p. 1102), ahl-i-rurn ~).) ~~\ (a native of Rum), adj. romi,
~ -1.);
....;-:;._
'Romish ' (p.
1103), adj. rilmi
y· u...~)
,
1'Umani
....;, jt...:.,/. );
'Greek'
3
THE WORD 'ROM '
During the Byzantine period, and for some centuries after, it
was considered an honour, evenLy the Turks, to be called a Rum,
and all the people in what is now European Turkey and a large
part of Asia Minor were so termed. The Turkish Admiral, idi
Ali Rer , who visited India, Afghanistan, entral Asia, and Persia
in the sixteenth century, called himself Rum with pride.
'Wherever be goes,' aid his tran lator, 'and whatever he sees,
Rum (Turkey) always remains in his eyes the most beautii'ul, the
richest, and the most cultured land of the whole world.' 1 He was
known under the fictitious name of Kiatibi Ru?n, or 'Turkish
writer.' One day the Emperor (in Hindustan) asked him whether
Turkey was larger than India, and he aid,' If by Turkey your
Majesty means Rum proper (i.e. the province of iva 2 ), then
India is decidedly the larger. But if by Turkey you mean all the
lands subj ect to the ruler of Rum, India is not by a tenth part as
lara e.'
To-day the word R -rn, Rom ( ince in Turkish, Arabic, Persian,
and Hindustani the same letter ) repre ents u and 8) is u ed
generally in a more restricted sense than formerly. It is applied
by Orientals to all reeks, about two million in number, who are
not natives of Greece, and in a still narrower sense to rnem bers of
(p. 499), sub. and adj., yunani
iU ~·, rii,mani
"-:? .,/"
..,l• -.•
A.
sub.
-
~
(p. 2399).
reciau '; 'Turkey' (the country),
iJ.J
~
~· \j...,
c-< •
,
(''.J
1 -../
'Byzantium,' 'the Ro~an Empire of the East,' 'Asia Minor,'' a part
Belot, A 1·ab. -French Diet.,
_,. \, , , i ../•J (p.
I .,/./
i ~_,.\
'Romish,' 'Greek Church,' Rum ,., , ;
1 ;
\...:: / /
of Asia Minor' (p. 109); Yonan ~~~' )?. 'Gr eek Ionia,' '
(p. 319).
yunaui, adj., 'Grecian,'
fo
·;-um ; 'Turkish Empire,' rum
Cameron, Egypt.-ATab.-Eng. Diet., 1um, pl. aru:am
'a Greek Chri tian,' also r1'lmi
R 1'lm
reece, ' 'Romelia,' ' Asia Minor' (p. 1199);
yii.nan, 'Ionia,'' Greece' (p. 2223) ; A.
m., 'a
hake peare, Hinclwstani
recian,' sub. or adj., ?"'ttmi; A. ,..,.,
,.., , n.lm,
Diet. (p. 2310), 'Greece,' yfmdn, rum,; '
'Rome,' 'the Turkish Empire,''
·,l"'. , .
'-:? ././
reece,' 'the Greeks'
' Byzantine,' ' Greek,' 1'Urn, pl. arwam
-
<"'"); Yun, Y ii.nan ,.,\j ._. , ,, ._.
Y. ./
- .)u ~'.,;..
'a Greek,' 'a H ellen.' Meyer, Conv. Diet.
2 0); sonimi, 1·um'iyah d.>..< • 1,
' the Greek nation ' ; J'unani
"
1.....5
;.l; ._,
../"
..;,./
Arab.-Germ., 'Orthodox Greek/1·ii.m · 'a reek, rumi, y-u nani, etc. Rosen, Colloq.
P er .-Gr. (p. 392), 'Tul'key,' Khal.·-'i- Rtl.m ,.. 1 ~6- (land of Turks).
I/-"
1
Tmvels and Adventu1·es of the 'J'w·ki h A dmiml, idi Ali Refs in Indiu. Afghani8tan, Ce11tral A . ia, and Per.~ia, 155 to 1556 A.D. Trauslated from the Turki h
by . Vn.mbel'y. London: Luzac and C . , J 99.
2 '
ur author means by ivas, the old eat of the 0 mans; but. in Inrlia and
entral Asia Rurn i generally und rstood to stanrl fur the west, and more particularly
for the Ottoman Elll pire. ' ( ~..o t e d from awLt!ry, K ote C-)
4
THE WORD
I
ROM
I
the Orthodox Greek Church in European Turkey, Africa, and
Asia, but not to those in Greece. In Greek the words Romeos
(PwJLaZos-), Ro?ni6s (Pwp.yck), which mean Roman,' are ~pplied to
Turkish Greeks. For an inhabitant of Greece proper different
words are employed. The Turks use Yunlini, Yunanli, and the
Greeks ''E!..A:7Jv, vulgar Greek ''E)\:A.7Jvas- (Hillin, Hellina ) ; for the
country 1 Greece' they say Yunan, I..:.)'UJ:: and 'EA.A.us- (Hellas),
respectively. 1 Yunan is from the Arabic and means~ Ionia.' The
Turkish Government also styles all Christians, and even Protestants, RiJ,m in their travelling Te, ke1'e. I have myself asked a
hundred yrian Arabs 'lnt Rum,' and the answer has come back
~A net R u m'(' Are you a R u?n ?'-'I am a Ru?n '). They were
Greek Catholics, of whom there are 60,000 or more in Syria.
Very often aiso have I heard the same word used in conversation
for a Turkish Greek.
Only the Gypsies of European Turkey and those derived from
them call themselves Rum. The name is not applied to themselves in Asia or Africa by the Gypsies. 2 De Goeje quotes two
cases which seem to be exceptions to this statement.3 One, Doum
(Douman), was given by Captain Newbold as used by Aleppo
Gypsies. The word was not collected by Captain Newbold himself,
but by another, and was Douman not Doum. The Captain
expressly states that he himself never beard or found this word,
nor Rom, used by or for any Oriental Gypsies.
ir Richard
Burton, who has incorporated this fact in his book on the Gyp ies,
makes the same assertion. Burton also states ·that Nawar,
Rum eli, and Chinganeh are all the same Gypsies.' 4 The word
1
1
Youssouf, 'l'u1·k.-F1·ench Diet., Rum
~).)
'Roman,'' Byzantine Greek, '' Modem
Greek of Turkey' (p. 4 5) ; Yunan ~\.; y.. 'Greece' ; Yunani
J \j)'!.
~ \_; aJ 'an inhabitant of Greece' (p. 629); Roma
Greece'; Yii11anli,
u
(p. 484) ; Riimi, adj.,
~
~).)
'a Greek of
L•• ,
'Rome'
-
'what appertains to the Romans, to the Byzantine
Greeks, or to the Modern-Greeks of Turkey' (p. 4 fi). Ru~icka.-Ostoic, Turk.-Genn.
Diet., R iim, R iiml ii, U1·iim, 'a Greek ' ; R fim Roma, Riinui, 'Rome ' (p. 369) ;
Yunan, 'Old Greece ' (p. 1 0). Karl Wied, 'J'm·k. Gram. (p. 16 ), 'a. Greek of
reece,' Y~"inanli ; 'a Greek who is a. Turkish subject,' rum. Petraris, j\lew GreekGerm. Diet., erm.-Greek part, 'a. Greek,' "EXX77v, vulg. ''EXX77vas; 'a N~w Greek,'
' PW}-'?JOS; ' Greece,' 'EXXd.s: G1eek- erm. part (p. 429), ·pw}-'alos, 'a Roman ' (p. 430);
PW}-'7], 'Rome,' vul. ' Pwl-'vos, 'a New Greek.'
ee also p. 314. Paspati, ' Pw}-tatot,
'the Byzantine. ,' p. 21. In conversation ~ reek s ay for a Turkish reek , Romeo ·,
Ro m~i/.-68 , sometimes R omeos; and for one from Greece, Helli n, H eltinas ; auJ for
t..reece, fl ~las.
2 .YlacH.itchie, 'l'he Gypsies of India, p. 43.
London, 1 6.
s lJe Goeje, ltfemoire su1·les m.i!11·ation-1 de.· 7' iyane.s, p. 69. Leirle, 1903.
" Burton, Th e J ew, the Gyp1:y, and l!.'l ];;lam , p. 217. London, 1 9 .
THE WORD
1
RO 1'
5
R u nuli is simply Turkish Greek (Ruz.-Os. Diet., p. 369, R'um
Ru1nlu, etc.). Burton also give R ·umeh as a word for Gypsies:
'Kurbat, Rumeh, Jinganeh.' Runteh is 'Rome' in Arabic.1 In
the same book it is stated (p. 231) that 'Consul E. T. Rogers of
Damascus, during two years' residence and lo~g tr::welling, never
heard any uch word as Du1ni. Neither did Captain Newbold nor
Sir Richard himself,' though he was at one time consul in
amaseus. Extensive enquiries by myself, verbally and by letter,
from native and European residents of Aleppo, Damascus, Bagdad,
and many other cities and towns in Asiatic Turkey, as well as in
Egypt and Persia, have led without exception to the same conclusion. No G.) psies out of Europe and America call themselv s
Rom or Run~, except European G.) psies who have wandered fi·um
their home. 2 Armenian and Kaukasian Gypsies often use the
word D,C~1n or Lom, formed by the common interchange of?' and l
or l ancl d, as in Luli and Luri, or Das, 'ten,' which in Afghan
isla .
Another explanation of de Goeje's word is not improbable.
There is a city Douma (Duma) of about 4000 inhabitants, distant
one day's ride from Beirut. Many Gypsies, I am informed by a
native, winter there, and, in their ummer circuit, would probably
visit Aleppo and call themselves JJoumiim (Du??uJ,ni), as does
every inhabitant of Douma. Two or three bands of Turkish
Gypsies from Europe camp outside the city every ) ear and give
shows and musical performances.
In Turkestan, Persia, and Beluchi tan, Gypsies do not call
themselves Rom or any variation of the word.
The mere similarity or even identity of words cannot, however,
settle the origin of the word Rom, Rum. The Rumanians call
their country Ro1nani a, and themselves Roman"i, which is
'Romans.' There are thou ands of Gypsies there now, and if it
were a fact that the Gypsies originated there (but it is not), we
I
Belot, ,F1·ench·A1·abic D ictiona,-y, p. 654, 'Rome,' R1tmeh /,·<_:), Roman,'
Riimani \,...!:c~' l-c/.,
.-.;
2 In Sy~ia the Rev. Harvey Porter, D. D., Professor in the
yrian Protestant
College, Beirut, for some years sturlied the Gypsies there for me, ma.ny of his
students assi ting him. On May the 14th, 1900, he wrote: 'The word Rum or Ru:mi ,
by which you think they call themselves, is the word used in Arabic for 'Modern
Greek,' and comes from' Rome'; since, when the Arabs came in contact with the
Greeks, the Roman Empire still existed in the EaEt. The word can have no
s i ~? ni.ficaoce as inoicating the origin of the Gypsies.' He also states that Syrian
Gypsies do not apply this word to thcn1sel ves so far as he can learn.
6
THE WORD ' R M '
should be sure that the Gypsy word Rmnane was simply' Romans.'
We must, however, consider all the facts and conditions which
environ the word.
That the Gypsies had ample opportunities for picking up the
word Rom, if they did not bring it with them, is evident from the
fact that their lanauaae has a large number of Greek words,
and must therefore have been subjected for a long time to the
influence of a Greek community. 1
This, however, does not
necessarily mean Greece; indeed, probably not, but rather the
whole Byzantine empire, not only in Europe, but in much of Asia
Minor, which contained millions of Greeks. The whole district
of Byzantine influence in Asia was rich, and likely to favour the
presence of. people like the Gypsies. Such considerations have
not been generally, if at all, taken into consideration. Long
before the Christian era this territory had a large Greek-speaking
population, particularly on the coasts. Gypsy could as well have
been subjected to Greek influences here as in Europe.
vVhen the Gypsies first came to these regions history doe not
tell us. \Ve can only judge and infer. If it be true that the
Gypsy word Rom is the same as, and came from, Ro??Utni,
'Romans,' such a fact would perhaps tend to show a greater
antiquity for them in Byzantine Asia than has been suppo ed.
And this is the view which occurs at once to those on the
spot. They say that Rom is a word used in European Turkey
for the Greeks there now, and during many centuries for all the
inhabitants of that district. 'The Gypsies were there too, and
naturally applied the same name to themselves. Why go to India
for the word?' they ask. I have never been able to give an
an wcr which satisfied any of them. 2 One Engli:sh officer took a
1 It is to be noticen that in the Constitution of Catalonia, 1512 A.D., Gyp ies
are mentioned as 'Bohemians and iools, styled Bohemians, Greeks, and Egyptians'
(J.tJ. L. ,..,·., Old erie , i. 37).
Bataillard also says that in 1512 some Gypsies
alleaed they were Greeks.
~ The Rev. J. Henry House, D. D., an American Mi ·sionary in
alouika, ug .
gested in a letter of August the 19th, 1901, that' the name" Rome" (Rom} , which
they give themselves, would indicate that they thought they were of Roman origin.'
The Rev. Lewis Bond, American Missionary in Monastir, wrote on October the
th, 1901, 'The Gypsies here call themselves Rome pronounced RO?n. My opinion
is this Rom is the same as Room, which is the word always used by the Turks for
a Christian subject. The 'I urks call Greeks Room, and in making out a travelling T e l.:e1·e for any Christian he is entitled as a Room, that is, as a Gr~ k
Orthodox. Even Protestants are thus entered. ' The Rev. I obert Thomson, an
American Missionary in Ramokov, Rnl garia, wrote to me on August the 24th, 1901,
t.hat • the Oyp ies of Bulgaria and H.um el!a call th m<: cl\'e · Rfi.mi, or Rami, au
abbreviation of
Ro m a t~i ,
which is just "llomans."' That 'they call the Turks
THE WORD 'RO ~'
·7
facetious v1ew of my insistence that the Gyp ie brought Rum
with them from their original home. He told me, and also wrote
that he felt confident, that if I considered the matter enough I
should find that word had exactly the same origin as the Arabic
d~lc R'fimi (a turkey).
A possible connection between the Gypsy Rom and Rome ha
of course, been entertained not infrequently. 1 Whiter suggested
it; and Borrow evidently regarded it as possible. In the introduction to his Zincali he says, indeed, 'there is no reason for
snppo ing that the word Roma or Rommany is derived from the
Arabic word which signifies Greece or Grecians, as some people
not much acquainted with the language of the race in question
have imagined.' But in the introduction t.o Laveng?·o be maintains that 'The meaning of Romany Chals is lads of Rome or
Rama; Romany signifying that which belongs to Rama or
Rome:' and he frequently translated Gypsy Romano by 'Roman.'
Groome quoted Lucretia Boswell, who regarded RO?nani as
equivalent to 'Roman woman,' and Crofton asked, 'Does R6mani
signify Roumanian?' 2
Are there any Indian words from which our word Rmn could
be descended? A few suggestions have been made, and much has
been written on this question. Childers's Pali Dictionary gives
words similar in form who e meaning might be supposed to be
appropriate, for in tance, R amano, 'pleasing,'' charming,· Ra?nani,
'a woman.' And when we find also so many clear Gypsy words,chirt~Js, time; choro, thief; chapo, child ; baro, great; aggi, fire ;
aklci, eye; anguro, charcoal; attha, eight (Gyp. ota); taruno,
young (Gyp. tarno); tulo, fat ; ti~ no, sharp, small; daso, slave
(Gyp. Da , Dacian Slave); divaso, day; dulclcho, painful; duro,
Horahai, or Orhai, from Orban, the first of the Turks to pass into Europe.' Orban
(1326-1359) gained a. footing in Europe by the taking of Gallipuli and other fortresses on the coast. This use of 01·hai may be significant of the early presence of
Gypsies there. These letters sufficiently illustrate the views of many 11eople living
in the Orient, who have written and told me the same thiug. They are familiar
with the East, its people, its history, its languages. They hear the word used in
conversation every day, as a term applied to millions of people there now, or
formerly there.
1 For various discussions of the word see Pot.t, i. pp. 35-43 ; MacRitchie,
Gyp.~ies of India, Note N, pp. 91-108; Paspati, pp. 19-21; and Ascoli, Zigeun eriiJches, p. 56. Some extraordinary speculations will be found in Luca"', '1'/J e Yetholm
Hi8tory of the Gyp. ies, pp. 66- . Kelso, 1 82. The last author, in his article
'Petty Romany' (Nineteenth Century, vol. viii. pp. 579-80, October l 0), argues
that they picked up the name in Rumania.
2
Journal of tiLe Gypsy Lore Society, Old Series, i. 50.
THE \Y RD ' R0:\1 '
far; clu e, cl i, two; ev ~. ju t ( yp. a a)· gajo, elephant; gtdo,
suo-ar; lc ~lo, black· and very many others; it eems at first as if
ypsy were Pali. For rali was a common spoken dialect of the
pe le long before the C:hristian era. We find a word, moreover,
similar to Luli, and very appropriate for one class of Persian
Gypsies and the Kabul Luli. A careful study shows, however,
that Gypsy never could have originated from Pali. Phonetics and
so many thing settle the contrary.
I have had interesting discus ions with several learned Hindu
Pandits about the words Rom, Rum, Rom,ani, Don~, Dum, Do'ms,
etc. None could suggest any parallel word in Sanskrit, nor in any
Hin u dialect, except pos ibly R1imcr-na, 'a lovely man,' and
Riiman -, 'a charming woman,'-evidently the same idea as
Pa pati's conjecture, kr. Rama, 'beautiful,' which wa rejected
with an emphatic ! by A coli. I have been unable to find any
probable word myself except perhaps Darn, Dum, and, what is
phonetically the same, Rmn,-the exact word used by Gypsies for
them elves in Europe or Armenia. To whom are they applied in
India? The Pandits knew the Dom well, but did not believe the
ypsy word Ro?n came from them, and they gave as their reason
that although there are Doms nearly all over India, they are of
different kinds.
That the word Dom does not indicate in India any well-defined
race is shown by Crooke,1 who describes many different varieties
among the 298,923 enu erated in the census of 1891. Some have
Gyp y-like habits, occupations, and modes of life, but not more
orne are
Gypsy-like than those of many other Indian nomads.
the very dregs of impurity, the Helots of all, shameless vagrants,
eaters of carrion, beggars and thieves: but others are fairly re~pect­
able farmers and arti ans. Their face is of a low type, and they
are generally described as Dravidians, although sometimes they are
supposed to be remnants of the aboriginal Mongolo-N egroides; 2
and those between Gn.ndaki and Gilo-it are a mixed tribe of
Thibetans and Hindu .3
orne are priests of evil spirits and preserve the pure demonis1n of the aborigines, and in some districts
1
Crooke, The .Yo1·th· II'e.'t P1·o1 incP8 of fnrlia, 1 97. Pa:Jsim.
Caldwell, quoted by Crooke, loc. cit., p. 49 ; Drew, 'l'he Jmnmoo, p. 56,
London, 1675; Pischel, 'Heimatb der Zigeuner,' D eutsclu. Rund cJ,an, vol. 3G,
p. 353 (Sept. 1 83), and J.G.L.S., New Series, ii., 312-3; Biddui}Jh, 'l'1·ib of
Hindu Koosh, p. 39; Ujfa.lvy, Le AnJens au 1:\ 01·d et au 1ul de l'Hindou-Kouch,
pp. 256-8, Paris, 1896.
a Franz von chwartz, Die Sindjluth, p. 21 , 1 94.
2
THE WORD 'ROM '
9
they admit outcasts and so increase. In one district, Baltistan,
the Chins call themselves Rom. 1
Moreover, the title Dom is quite unlike the Gypsy Rom in that
it is one of which the bearer is not and could not be proud. Mr.
H. H. Risley wrote to me that it 'is probably a tribal name, of the
same type as Kol, H o, etc., meaning rc man."' But in Pashto, as
Dr. Grierson informs me, it is used for 'a native of India who is a
professional singer and reciter,' and a Moslem belonging to AU~k
eight miles west of Peshawur, asserts that in the Punjab it signifies
' comedian,' 'a man to make fun,' and that they are of different
races in different districts, but have the same trade or profession.
The contrast between Doms and Gypsies is very striking. The
Gypsies are the same race, the same Romane, everywhere they are
found, and are so recognised in diflerent countries by everybody
who meets them; and they all have the same secret Romani chib.
But the Dum of India are not all the same. There are several
kinds of Dum widely differing in life, habits, customs, personal
appearance, and language. There is no one secret Dum tongue.
'Vhere the Gypsies wander there are no other castes similar in
character and life. In India there are many other nomad tribes
and castes, not Dums or so called, but certainly as Gypsy-like.
Indeed some are more Gypsy-like than most, if not all, Dums.
Nobody in India uses Dum as a word for Gypsies, or the nomad
Gypsy -like classes. 2
To sum up, we have the fact that the Byzantines before the
Christian era called themselves Rorn, and that the Oriental word
for the Latin ' Romani,' Rurn, was and is applied to them, and to
the modern Greeks, by all western Orientals even the Mghans.
The Greeks to-day, everywhere except in Greece, apply the same
name to themselves.
The Romans were proud to be Rornans. 3 A Roman citizen
felt himself the equal of Kings. The Byzantines, with equal pride,
claimed to be Romans. So do the European Gypsies. The African
1
Ujfalv), Zoe. cit., p. 313. Drew also mentions a. caste called Rom in a village
in Dardistan. He could not identify it with any other, and did not meet the name
elsewhere.
'
2
Under the word 'Gypsy' in Hindi dictionaries are found kan}ar, khana-ba
do.sh, na,tni (fern.), ~hagni (fern.). Shakespeare, p. 2308, gives 'Gypsy, khana-ba-
dosh (dakh) gurguri-wala ; p.
975, ~)'-'-! A,j k;.. khana-ba-dosh, a traveller, a
pilgrim, a gipsy, rover, sojourner (house on the shoulder).' The word khana-badosh is perhaps the Hindu word which would best translate our word Gypsy, and
the one most commonly used for all Gypsy-like nomads. Dum is not so used.
3
Cf. Acts xvi. 37-8.
V.-b
10
THE WORD ' RO)l '
and Asiatic Gypsies do not use the word R om. Between Europe
and India there is a wide expanse of territory full of Gypsie.-,
practically none of whom call themselves Ron . Despi ed by
everybody, and despising everybody in turn, the Gypsies of E urope
still proudly call themselves R u m . Very likely it is imply the
native pride which most people feel for their race. But n oToes
and many other races and peoples do not exhibit such a racial
self-satisfaction, and certainly the Dom of India is not proud of
his title. The meanings an l uses of the word R orn and 1J01n are
a different as the race which bear them.
On the other hand, the lan auage of the European Gypsies h as
plainly been affected greatl; by Greek, in some district where
Greek was spoken, whether in the Europen.n or Asiatic portion of
Byzant, one or both· and they are to-day most numerou in that
part of Byzant which now is European Turkey. It would h ave
been difficult for them to n.void picking up the word R on during
their long sojourn in this district, and they u e it in the sen e
which would be expected were this the case.
\
THE GYPSY LORE SOCIETY
ALL interested in the study of the Gypsies are invited to
join the Gypsy Lore Society, the aim of which is to
promote and facilitate such study by the publication
of a Journal. This Journal appears quarterly and includes
articles dealing with the Language, Ethnology, and Folk-Lore
of the Gypsies, written by the chief authorities on these
subjects, popular essays of interest and high merit, reviews
of all publications which relate to the 'Affairs of Egypt,' and
a Notes and Queries section of shorter but not less important
contributions.
The annual subscription to the Society is one pound sterling,
payable in advance on July 1, and intending members should
apply to the Honorary Secretary, R. A. Sco'TT MACFIE, Esq.,
M.A., B.Sc., 6 Hope Place, Liverpool, Great Britain, who will be
glad to give any further information.
ft
Times.-' We welcome the re'Vival of a journal which deserves the
support of students of philofogy and of racial character, as well as that
of the specialists to whom it more directly appeals. Mr. David
MacRitchie has enlisted the help of so many scholar_s at home and
abroad that the enterprise may claim to be of international interest.'
Mercure de France.-' Instrument indispenEable de travail non
seulement aux specialistes, mais a tous ceux curieux de savoir, ce que
sont au juste les Tsiganes, groupement fractionne d'une origine
lointaine.'
Gottingische gelehrte Anzeigen.-' Wie man sieht, ist das neue
Journal mit Erfolg bemtiht, der Zigeunerkunde weitere F..Ordernng zu
bringen. Wir begriisseu es mit aufrichtiger Freude und wtinschen
ihm · eine langere Lebensdauer, als seinem Vorganger beschieden
gewesen ist .'
THE GYPSY LORE SOCIETY
I
6
HoPE PLACE, LIVERPOOL, GREAT BRITAIN
To
fT.-( /1¥c...Li. _,..
/¥
c. ~
~~ ~C..-. fa.'-~
~"1~o-
.·
be.
~ ,c:;_ _:L
.~
FOLK.-SONGS AND MUSIC OF CATALU- A
BY A. T. SINCLAIR
REPRINTED FROM THE JoURNAL OF AMERICAN FOLK-LORE,
VoL. XXJII.-APRIL-JUNE , 1910.-No. LXXXVIII
FOLK- SONGS AND J\1USIC OF CATALUNA
BY A. T. SINCLAIR
THE folk-songs, music, dances, musical instruments, floral and
other festivals, the customs, the Catalan dialect, - all confirm what
history records, that Catalufia, Provence, Languedoc, and other districts, at one time formed one people.
It may be interesting to the members of the American Folk-Lore
Society to learn something of the splendid work a si ·ter folk-lore
society is doing in Spain.
The Centre Excursjonista de Catalunya" has for its object collecting and preserving everything connected with the hi tory, art,
language, traditions, customs, folk-songs, music, dancing, and people
of Cataluiia, and also making mountain excursions in the Pyrenees.
It is a most flourishing society, which publishes a monthly journal,
handsome in appearance, and with fine photographs of church porches,
costumes, dances, etc. One branch of this club is called "The FolkLore Section," the work of which is illustrated by the fact that it has
already collected five thousand folk-songs with variants, and three
hundred folk-dances. Many of these have already been published
with the music, and the remainder will soon appear in print.
The Smithsonian Institution has recently arranged for an exchange
of publications with this society. Two articles by myself in this Journal - " Gypsy and Oriental Music" (January- March 1907, p. 16)
and "Gypsy and Oriental Musical Instruments (April- September,
1908, p. 205) - led the Secretary of the Cataluiia Society, Mr. J\.L S.
Gatuellas, to correspond with me on these subjects. The result has
been the acquisition of many facts which are new and interesting,
especially about tnusical instruments.
During the winter and spring of 1909, Senor Gatuellas delivered a
course of lectures before their Folk-Lore Society on "Gypsy Music,"
in which he also treated somewhat all Spanish music. The lectures
were illustrated by songs interpreted by the best artists of the Orphe6
Catala and Barcelona. This musical society (Orphe6 Catala) has a
2
Journal of American Foll<,-Lore
handsome building of its own, containing a large exhibition-hall, clubroom, musical library, etc., and has done much to encourage and
foster the study of folk-songs and music.
Mr. Gatuellas has made a special study of Spanish music and musical instruments, in which he has received the assistance and cooperation of the musical people in Catalufia.
He expressed the following conclusions. The popular music of
southern Spain differs notably from that of Catalonia. The Andalusian
music has its principal source in Gypsy music, and also is largely
influenced by the Arabic, and both are Oriental. The Arabs were
established there for eight hundred years, much longer than in the
rest of Spain. In the north are found the gaitas, tenoras, grallas, tamborilos, andjloviols of different forms; while in Andalusia, the country
of Gypsies and toreros (bull-fighters), we see guitars and castanets.
In the north the type of music is Gallic; in the northeast, Provens;al;
and in the south it is Oriental.
The Provens;al influence is more pronounced in the northeastern
and central parts of Catalonia and on the slopes of the Pyrenees;
willie in the music of the "Campo de Tarragona," we hear the echoes
of the Roman and Arabic civilization.
Musical I nstruments.- The bagpipe is called by many different
names in Spain. Indeed, nearly every district has a special nickname;
but the name gaita is the general, common word everywhere. Cornamusa is sometin1es used.
The favorite term for it in Catalufia is Sach de gemachs (saco de
lamentaci6nes), a literary as well as a colloquial word.
In the Balearic Isles, the nickname X irimies is common. The origin
of the word is due, it is said, either to th:e resemblance of the droning
pipes to the lamentations of Jeremiah, or to the similarity of these
tones to the word X irimies.
The bagpipe is found in very many districts, but especially in
Galicia, where every holiday, every festival is enlivened by its strains,
and all the dances are danced to its music.
Formerly, even in Cataluiia, it was heard everywhere, indeed at
the very gates of Barcelona (Llano de Llobreget), and was "the king
of in truments" in all the coblas. This name cobla is applied to the
rural orchestras, which consisted of a bagpipe, a tenora (a kind of
oboe) , a tamboril (small drum) , and a floviol (a flageolet). In the
"Campo de Tarragona" a gralla was also used. At every festival
and on every holiday could have been seen in bygone days these
coblas entertaining the peasantry, and furnishing their dance music.
To-day, unfortunately, the "march of progress," the ease of communication, the modern pian.inos (hand-organs), have driven into
oblivion their old-fashioned orchestras, the pride of the mountain
Folk-Songs and },fusic of Cataluna
3
villages. It is only rarely that some old gaitero (bagpiper), driYen
from his mountain home by a poor harvest, appears in the capital
city, and that the "moaning" of his gaita is heard.
Not so in Galicia A..,turias, and the Baleares, especially the island
of Mallorca whose inhabitants play it with religious zeal; and it i
to the measures of the bagpipe that are danced the Mufieiras in
Galicia, the Purisalla or Purrisalta in A. turias, etc.
One photograph from Palma, the capital of Mallorca represents a
peasant's dance. The music is a guitar and a bagpipe, the upper part
of the bag of which ends in an animal's head. The handsome country
lassies are dressed in their beautiful and picturesque costumes with
lace headdresses falling to the shoulders, and brought round the neck
in front.
Another shows a group of five n1u icians. Three are playing their
bagpipes, which have two or three drones hanging down on th.e right
side and a chanter and blow-pipe. The other two are playing a
floviol held in the left hand; while the right beats the tamboril suspended by a cord round the neck, and twisted about the left forearm,
so th at it hangs just below the arm in a convenient position for the
single drumstick to reach it.
Still another photo portrays the " Cosies de :rviontuiri." The dancers are attired in curious fantastic costumes of olden times some
wearing masks, and the music is furnished by two musicians like
those last described.
· In Mallorca also is still performed, in the church at Allora, a religious dance every year at the festival of St. John. The dancers are six
boys in tall hats, with one high-pointed peak standing up from each
side, and otherwise in a peculiar costume. i\nother boy, called the
dama, is dres ed as a girl. The music is two guitars, and one small
guitar (called guitarina) about eighteen inches long, and ha ing a
round body like a banjo some ten inches in diameter. It is new to
most people that such a dance is now to be seen in a church in Spain,
except in Seville.
A similar dance is also performed yearly just outside the churchdoor, in honor of San Juan Palos, at Felenitz, Mallorca. One of the
boys is dressed as St. John, and bears a cross. The musical instruments used there are a drum, guitar and a violin.
An ancient dance of Ampurdan is the Sardana, which within four
years has become the" rage" in Barcelona. Everybody is dancing it,
for everybody dances in Spain; and all composers feel it a duty to write
a new Sardana; that is, new mu ic for thi dance, but all made and
elaborated from folk-melodies. Already more than a hundred new
Sardanas have been published. The Sardana is now proclaimed the
national dance of Catalufia. The tradition, or perhaps part of it at
4
Journal of American Folk-Lore
least, which might be called the old myth current among the Ampurdanese, is this. The Sartos were a great and powerful nomadic race,
who assisted in the building of many of the enormou~ monuments and
edifices now seen as ruins in Egypt. They belonged in Asia, and carried
with them to Greece a dance like the Sardana. In antiquity the
Greeks founded a large colony, Emporyon, the modern Ampurdan,
which extended from the Gulf de Rosas (Rhodyon) to Guesaria (now
Sant Feliu de Guixols). Extensive excavations have been made in
this district, and many ancient Greek vases discovered upon which
are displayed figures engaged in a dance similar to the Sardana, and
which is claimed to be its origin. These Sartos were half-giants, and
lived all along the Spanish and French shores of the Mediterranean,
and are suppo ed to have given their name to Sardinia; but they always continued to be nomads. The Ampurdanese are large in size,
and furni h all the mountain-artmery soldiers for the Spanish army.
Such is the folk-belief held in Ampurdan. The dance reminds one
strongly of the kolo) - a popular dance to-day in Greece, Kroatia,
Servia, Bulgaria, and the whole Balkan Peninsula. Both sexes join
hands and form a circle, sometimes containing three hundred persons,
while inside the ring numerous smaller circles are formed. The
dance is complicated and elaborate in its measures and figu res, and
requires skill and practice for all to exactly fit the peculiar music and
make the Spani h stop on the right note.
It is supposed to represent the twenty-four hours of the day,eight for sleep, and sixteen for the waking hours. The measures for
sleep are sorrowful; but suddenly the crowing of the cock is imitated
by the shrill tones of the floviol, and every dancer must be precisely
in time and place, ready for the joyful measures of day. The dance
occupies eight or ten minutes, and the music is exceedingly peculiar,
but greatly admired by the Catalans.
The musicians of the coblas are country-people. Some are peasants
who earn a few pesetas by playing a tenora or other instrument at
festivals. Others have some musical education, and form the coblas
which travel over Cataluiia. Those of the best coblas are professional
musicians. The most famous is La Ampurdanesa Cobia," led by
Senor Sureda, who has verified the details of instruments here given.
Another celebrated cobla is ' La Principal" of the town of Perelada.
E ery town of much size in Ampurdan has its cobla which plays Sunday afternoons in La Plaza l\1ayor and sometimes visits other towns.
The amusement adverti ements in the Barcelona newspapers always contain notices of where several coblas can be heard afternoons
and evenings.
With the Sardana these coblas have become the fashion. A cobla
de Sardanas has one floviol; la primera and segunda. tiple; one tam-
Folk-Songs and Music of Cataluna
5
boril; two tenor as, primera and segunda; primera and segundo cornetin
de piston; two fiscornes a cilindro, primer and segundo; one contrabajo;
and sometimes two trombones are added.
(a) The jloviols are pastoral instruments, typical of the Pyrenees,
with very slight variations in construction in different districts. The
Rousillon instrument said to be called jlaviol is the same as the Catalan which is written jloviol but pronounced flu'viol. The " Essayos
de Critica J\1u ical/' par Antonio Noguera, Preface by Juan Alcover
y Maspone (Palma, 1903), an exhaustive work on the music, etc.,
of Mallorca, gives fabiol.
The shepherds make them of reeds (caiia) just like those represented in old pictures, etc. These are roughly made, but have a powerful tone. Those used by the Barcelona coblas are turned out of ebony,
or granadillo (wood), and are very nicely made. They have five finger-holes and four keys. There is neither mouthpiece nor reed, only
what is vulgarly called llengueta de floviol. In short, it is a sort of
flageolet about twenty centimetres long.
(b) The tiple is a wind-instrument. In Alt6 Arrag6n a kind of
guitar (small) is called tiple. The tiple of the coblas is a little larger
than an oboe, and thicker, and is sixty centimetres long. It is made
ofjinjoli or cerezo (cherry) wood, and has six finger-holes, twelve keys,
and a double reed mouthpiece larger than that of the oboe.
(c) The tamboril is a very small drum. Those still used by the
coblas of Ampurdan itself are of antique type. One of these measured
by the writer was a hand orne instrument very well made, four inches
high, and three inches and a half in diameter. The body was of a
black wood, and both ends were covered with skin, held in place by
two yellowish wood rims. Cross-strings run down the sides, which
could be tightened by a key. There was a round hole in the side of the
body. The single drumstick was neatly turned from ebony, and one
foot long.
The tamboril-player also plays the jloviol. The Mallorca tamboril
is somewhat larger.
In Catalan, tamboril is written tamborf (but pronounced tambur!)
and also tamborino.
One verse of the dance-song "Ball de Sant Farriol'' ( ' Bulleti del
Centre Excur ionista de Catalunya," Num. 171, April, 1909, p. 114)
runs thu : " Joy lo pastor - viviriem d' amoretes.
Joy lo pastor - viviri em d' 1' amor,
Glori6s Sant Farrio1 - ballarem, si De u ho val.
Lo qui toea '1 tamborino- n' ha perdut e1 flo viol."
"He who plays the tamborino, has not lost the floviol," alludes to
the fact that one musician plays both.
6
Journal of American Folk-Lore
The miraculous wine-skin of Saint Farriol always kept itself full! ~
(d) La tenora is made of granadillo or jinjoli wood . has six fingerholes thirteen keys, and the mouthpiece is double reed similar to
that of the jogote. It has a bell mouth of white metal thirty centimetres long and twenty centimetre wide at the mouth; whole length,
ninety centimetres. Its tone is trident, sounding as much like wood
as metal, peculiar, yet agreeable, and very melodious. It is the clas ical jnstrument of Ampurdan on which Sardanas are played, and it is
al o u ed in Rou ilion.
(e) The cornetin de piston is the same as the French cornette a piston.
( f) The fiscorne a cilindro is a brass in trument with valves made
in Catalufia, but the cilindros are bought in Germany. The in trument called in music-store there fiscorne, and used in theatre orchestras, is different from that of the coblas.
l\1r. Victor Mahillon writes me that from my description it is similar to the Flugelhorn.
~ (g) The contrabajo is our double-bass vioL
( The tiples, tenoras, floviols, and tamborils are made by country
people. At Sant Feliu de Pallarols (bajos Pirineos) is one shepherd
instrument-maker, and in Figueras another, who has inherited his
profession.
The contrabajo andfiscorne are in the key of C natural; the cornetines
and tenoras, in B flat; the tiples and floviols, in F natural.
(h) Of grallas there are many kinds. Those in the north Asturias
Castillas are well known, but these differ much from those of the
Xiquets of Valls (Campo de Tarragona). These ate made of wood,
forty centimetres in length, have six finger-boles and four keys, and a
double reed mouthpiece smaller than that of the oboe.
The Xiquets de Valls are a class of showmen gymnasts peculiar to
the city of Valls. They appear in the cities of Cataluna on the days
of festivals, and build their human castillos (castles) eight or nine
stories high, to the shrill, ringing tones of their grallas, and to the
rattle of their tambores (drums).
The name " Xiquet" is applied in Valls to the smallest member
of a family whether child, man, young or old. A special melody is
played while these castillos are building. These in Catalan called
castells or espedats are raised in this manner. Four, six, or eight men
who resemble toros (bulls) form the base, according to the number of
stories to be built. On to this base climb the same number of men less
one, making the second piso (story); and so one story i raised above
another each one less man than the one below it until only one story
remains, which is formed by a chiquillo (small bov) called usually
baylet. The espedats (abismo in Catalan) are made with only one man
for a story. Both castellos and espedats are sometimes even ten stories
I
Folk-Songs and Music of Cataluna
7
7
high, which occasionally break down and fall. "\\ hen they come to
Barcelona and salute the Consejo Municipal, they form an espedat
and scale the balcony, and the baylet pre ents his greetings to the
Alcalde of the city.
The Pan's pipe called zampona is used in the centre of Spain, and
the adjacent di tricts north and south of it; but it is now largely relegated to the remote parts of the mountains. It is not infrequently
seen, however, even in Barcelona, played by wandering esmotets
(scis ors-grinders). These generally belong in Central pain, but some
of them are Gallegos (from Galicia, etc.), and some come from the
French Pyrenees. Occasionally also a Castillian beggar is seen soliciting alms to the sound of his zampona.
Some of these traveiling cu tiers have zamponas made in the old
style of reed ; but generally, thanks to their cheapness, metal ones
are used.
The one I have obtained in Barcelona, is of white metal, has twelve
tubes or pipes from r% inches to 37 6 inches long. The holes vary in
diameter from ~ inch to %6 inch, and are stopped about one inch
from the bottom with wood or cork. They are held together by a
metal band % inch wide, and beginning 2 inch from the top; and
this and the pipes are also soldered together. It is neatly made, and
has a scale of an octave and a half.
These are musical instruments in the proper sense of the word; but
zamponas of-oat-straws etc. , are made by the boys in many districts,
especially some parts of Andalusia and the centre of Castille. In brief,
in Spain just as in Italy, although the Pan's pipe has almost disappeared as a musical in trument, as a boy's toy it is common in large
districts. Some infer from this fact that it was in common use, and
references in literature tend to confirm this view.
The Spanish folk-music, sometimes low, sweet touching and again
gay joyous, so full of life and vigor as to . et the feet and fingers in
motion, has a peculiar fascination, and it is always melodious. The
rich tore and variety of this music, and also of folk-songs , are very
great and cannot fail to interest all lovers of folk-lore. The Centre
Excursionista is cultivating this field with all the ardor and enthusia m of their Southern blood.
There is a story among the people of Spain- indeed, the scene
has been depicted in a noted painting - of the church prelates who
assembled to pass judgment on the propriety of the Saraband dance.
They E tened to the arguments of the accusers with stern brows and
forbidding aspect. The case seemed hopeless; but son1ebody suggested that the prelates should view the dance itself to confirm what
was plainly their coming decision. Some graceful bailarinas were
brought in, who commenced the dance to the catching melody. The
8
Journal of American Folk-Lore
faces of the judges soon began to relax, and a look of pleasure strolled
over their features, until at last, carried away by the fascinating
strains, the prelates themselves joined with gusto in the dance.
Perhaps this is merely a story, but it well illustrates the peculiar;
bewitching charm of Spanish mllsic.
ALLSTON (BOSTON), MASSACHUSETTS.
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T ATT OOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
BY A. T. SINCLAIR
I NTRODUCTION
Many years ago while investigating Oriental Gypsies I found
that tattooing was one of their principal and characteristic occupations, and that nearly all of the common people in Syria, Mesopotamia, Arabia, Egypt, and at least parts of Persia were tattooed,
and so in Egypt were many of the rich. The most of this tattooing
is done by the Gypsies. They are the experts. Wherever the
Bedouin go there go the Gypsies (Naw ar), who also do tlzeir
tattooing .
In all these countries tattooing is a very old custom, going back
to the most ancient times. Some of the oldest cuneiform inscriptions discovered in Babylon show it to have been then and there a
common practice. It was a custom among the old Hebrews which
Moses prohibited by his Law. A Persian in Susa tattooed the
head of a slave, first shaving his head. After the hair had grown
out again to conceal the mes age, he sent him to warn his friend
Aristagorus of the treachery of Persia. It was the general practice
of the Phenicians and other Semites. So the custom is ancient in
E gypt. The early Christians tattooed themselves with religious
devices. The practice has persisted and continued in all the above
mentioned countries down to the present time.
Since the N awar are the professional tattooers there now, the
question arises, How long have they been such? Did they bring
any peculiar designs, processes, or tattooing customs with them, or
simply adopt in each country the devices popular and a trade they
A M . A TH. , N. S ., I o-2 4 .
36 I
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
(N. S., 10, 1908
found lucrative? With the hope of perhaps throwing some light
on such questions, for years I have carefully studied tattooing in
all countries where Gypsies are now found, and considered also
India.
Mr H. H. Risley (now Sir Herbert) wrote me, August 28, 1902,
that the subject was new in India and they had just taken up its
study. He also suggested that a comparison of Hindu tattooing
with Gypsy might lead to interesting results ; the tattooing in India at
least often is performed by a Gypsy-like class. The fascination of
the subject and the suggestions of so many have led me to go into
it broadly and generally. It is beset with many difficulties. There
is no comprehensive work on tattooing, and very little has been
written on it as to the Western Orient, or India.
I.- THE WESTERN ORIENT
It is an old custom for Christian pilgrims to Jerusalem to be
tattooed there with some religious symbol, their name, or initials,
and the date of their pilgrimage. The Armenian word for a
pilgrim is mtthdest (mtth death, dest I saw). Hence this name is
applied to a tattoo mark done in Jerusalem. It is also spoken
1'n uks'i, 1nukdzsz., 1nukdesz.. Since such pilgrims are practically the
only Armenians tattooed, it has become the ordinary and indeed
only word for tattoo mark in Armenian. Occasionally an Armenian is seen who when a boy had a dot or a minute cross made
on his hand, but hardly one in a hundred. Even then, however,
he calls it malzdesi. The Armenian women as well as men make
this pilgrimage and are all tattooed there in the same way. I have
examined more than a hundred such devices, which they always
show with pride as it is considered a great honor to be a Mahdesi.
And they gladly explain the details and significance of the designs,
why and where they were made, and often give traditions about
the origin, reasons, and antiquity of the practice. Such pilgrims
are entitled to be called Mahdesi John, Jacob, etc., as the name
may be.
The pious duty of every good Moslem is to make the pilgrimage to Mecca, and many also go to Medina. Thousands go every
year and from all parts of the Mohammedan world, even from Tur-
SINCLAIR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
kestan, India, and the Far East. So here as at Jerusalem it is now
as for centuries the custom for all pilgrims to be tattooed, with the
date of pilgrimage, name or initials, and holy devices. Some Africans whose skin is too dark to show tattooing have three gashes
made on the right cheek, which were the tribe mark of Mahomet
and were borne by him on his cheek.
Such a Moslem pilgrim is called in Turkish Httjt, and this word
applied hence to such tattooing made in Mecca is now the only
word for any tattoo mark. Sometimes I have seen a spot at the
root of the thumb of a Turk made when a boy, but he always still
applied the word lzaji to it. It is contrary to the Koran to be tattooed, and as the Turks are very stri.c t Mohammedans few are
marked otherwise.
In Arabic the word for tattoo mark is da' qqa, the root of which
means "striking." It is often pronounced da" a, or da' ka. The
common people, who are usually the only ones tattooed, know
of no other word. There are many other words given in Arabic
lexicons, as wasm, mark or brand; washim, z'tntl, etc., some of which
are literary, but they are not used as "tattoo" by the people.
An Arab pilgrim to Mecca is styled Ha;ji, or Ha;j~ and so are
his tattoo devices imprinted there.
When asked why they allow themselves to be so marked simply
for ornament as so many Moslems are, their answer is: "Before
entering Paradise we shall be purified by fire and all these marks
will disappear ! "
I have examined the tattoo devices on many hundreds of Syrian
and Egyptian Arabs as well as other Orientals, heard their stories
as to who did it, why, where, the meaning of the designs and the
traditions. With them often it is a matter of importance, and they
are much interested in the subject. Many of them had traveled in
other countries, and everywhere noticed the amount of tattooing,
the devices, and the operators. Lane in his admirable work, Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians, speaks of tattooing
called dakk as common among the lower classes in Egypt, and
states it is performed by Gypsy women. A few other writers have
cursorily remarked that some Bedouins or other Arabs were tattooed. But I have never seen any publication which gave infor-
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
[N. S., 10, 1908
mation of the fact that all the lower orders in the above named
districts were tattooed. or that it was done by Gypsies. Even
Wuttke, Joest, and others who had carefully studied the general
subject evidently were not aware of these facts as to the Western
Orient. Some Europeans who have lived there I find know about
it just as the natives all do. But most of them never notice such
things, or if they do can give no particulars. There are, of course,
almost innumerable books written about these countries.
Here we have an important, pregnant fact: An immense territory populated by millions in which all the poorer class are tattooed,
and every person generally with many devices, and particularly the
women on many parts of the body. Very few writers have even
alluded to any tattooing, and few Europeans know the facts. This
neglect by authors to mention the matter and give full details here
is an important consideration to be kept in mind when considering
the subject in other parts of the world.
The difficulties of the most distinguished experts in learning the
full, accurate particulars are illustrated well by Marquardt, Die Tiitow irung (etc.) in Samoa (1899). He tells us (p . 7) that Prof. von
Luschan examined the devices on a troupe of Samoans, consisting
of about thirty men and twenty-seven women in Berlin, whom
he described in his B eib-ag zur I<entniss der Tiitowirung in Samoa
(1897). His conclusions were that "not one of the women was
tattooed in the old fashion." Marquar[lt found however that seventeen of them were so marked, but on parts of the body covered
by clothing. Later Marquardt made a special study of the whole
subject in Samoa, and discovered that even now all the men and
sixty to seventy percent of the women are still tattooed most- elaborately in the ancient fashion. This is directly contrary to what
had been supposed to be the fact.
So George Turner in his Nineteen Years in Polynesia, and John
B. Stair in Old Sa11'2oa, most excellent works, do not mention any
tattooing of women.
Many similar examples can be given of careful writers who have
failed to mention tattooing at all, or give an entirely wrong impression about peoples all of wh~m were tattooed.
Some writers, as General Robley as to New Zealand, have
SI CLAIR
J
TATTOOING- ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
drawn the conclusion that because tattooing was not mentioned by
writers at a certain epoch the custom did not then exist.
Wuttke remarks simply that according t o R. Brown the Haida
Indians tattoo the arms, hands, and backs. Now we know the Haida tattooing was the most elaborate and elegant in America, and all
were tattooed, and all over the body.
Careful study, however, will often disclose full facts even from
very meager details. If we know " no man will marry a Polynesian
girl unless she have a small triangle tattooed on her person at
puberty," and that all children of such an unmarked woman are
killed, we may be sure all women there are tattooed. If the Dakota
believed that the ghosts of none of them could travel the ghost road
in safety unless they had a tattoo device on their forehead or wrist,
it is certain that all Dakota had this mark. When we find in any
region a few belonging to all classes, high and low, tattooed beautifully and extensively by professionals, it indicates a careful cultivation of the art, and a very general practice.
This is not the place to consider these points at length. But
the almost universal and extensive practice of this art in the Western Orient, facts known to so few, makes an admirable illustration.
Again, it is a question worthy of thought whether the practice has
not been widely spread from here and India (where tattooing is
general) to the Farther East and Africa. Arabs and Indians and
their culture for thousands of years have visited and influenced
very distant countries. We find it in words "Kafir," "Moro,"
"Buddhist," in musical instruments and so many other things.
In the Western Orient it is the common tradition that tattooing
is a very ancient custom and that the mark set upon Cain was a
tattoo mark which protected him. But why from the surrounding
hostile tribes?
Herodotus, n, I I 3, tells us that "a slave who escaped to the
temple of Hercules in Egypt and was tattooed there could not be
retaken by his master.'' Some marks seem to have been a protection.
Nearly all the tattooed individuals I have examined stated that
the Gypsies do the tattooing even in Jerusalem, Mecca, and Medina.
A large number of the better class of Orientals not themselves tattooed, confirm this statement. Boys and girls and sometimes
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
adults make simple and rude figures, but it is clear that the good
work is most of it done by Gypsies. The universal assertion has
been made that all pilgrims to Jerusalem, Mecca, and Medina are
tattooed in those cities and by the N au·ar.
Thevenot relates that on his visit to Jerusalem in I 6 58 they
were all tattooed, as was the custom of all pilgrims. So Godard
(r86z) speaks of a Russian Grand Duke tattooed there. Joest and
others mention two kings and kaisers and other princes who felt
bound to follow the custom of all pilgrims.
A large proportion of our naval officers at some time visit Jerusalem, and I have never been able to hear of one who did not conform to the usual custom. One petty officer, a first-class yeoman,
was the only exception. He told me that he should have been but
did not have time. So the Moslems who had been in Mecca or
Medina, all were tattooed there and insisted everybody else was. I
suspect, however, that many of the better class of Turks do not
permit any such marks to be made on them.
Many of the Mahdesi Armenians were indignant at the suggestion that they would allow a "Gypsy dog" to touch them. But
the sly Gypsies, some are Christi-~ns and some are Moslems, and
very often conceal their identity and deny they are Gypsies. They
do that everywhere. The general assertion and I think the fact is
that Gypsies do the sacred tattooing. This view is confirmed by
most if not all of the intelligent non-tattooed Orientals I have
questioned about it.
Oriental Gypsies themselves are tattooed when it is the cu tom
generally in the East. Some Gypsies in Van are. But the European Gypsies are never tattooed. Hence their tattooing is an easy
mode of identifying Oriental Gypsies who are often seen in all parts
of Europe and America.
II.- CIVILIZED
NATIO
s
The extent of tattooing among the peoples of Europe and North
America is much greater than is generally realized. Gypsies are
found in all this territory sometimes as now belonging in the different countries, and sometimes as wanderers from elsewhere. These
facts have led me for many years to investigate this tattooing in the
SINCLAIR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
various countries by a personal examination of the marks on people
tattooed, and by inquiries. The only countries in which I have been
able to learn that Gypsies have practised the art are Greece, Italy,
and Sweden.
In Greece the sailors seen in the Pir~us are generally tattooed.
I have seen a few Greeks who have been marked when in the army
with military devices, as two cannon crossed, a wreath around them,
etc., but it is not a general practice among Greek soldiers. Often
prisoners tattoo one another as a pastime in the jails. Among the
Greeks generally however there is very little of it. Often bands of
Oriental Gypsies are seen in Greece as showmen, etc., and sometimes these offer to and do tattoo some of the peasants. Indeed some
country people kn ow the Arab word for tattoo mark, da' ktt. They
call these Gypsies Syriti ni. The ordinary Greek work for tattoomark is pltOtograplzt a (cp(l)nvrpar.j;!.a), or mtirka (p.d.pJCa). Sometimes sylt (auJ.1), scar, and st ma, mark, are used.
In Italy, the sailors, porters, etc., in Naples are very generally
tattooed. Prisoners everywhere there often are marked by each
other in prison, just as in Greece. Otherwise, and except those
marked at Loreto, among many hundreds I have not found one tattooed south of Lombardy. The statements of all have been that, except as above, Italians do not practise the custom. All are familiar
with these Arab Gypsies, who often appear at country fairs, and
wander about, and occasionally tattoo a "reckless youth." Some
of them had seen this done. The Italian words are r etratto (picture),
marco (mark), segno (sign), devoz ione (devotion), tatuaggio. I have
usually heard retratto, marco, and de·ZJoz ione.
Among the two hundred Italian fisherman (mostly Sicilians
from Messina, Palermo, Catania, etc.) in Boston, not one is tattooed.
Lombroso states that there is more in Piedmont and Lombardy
where the Keltic element is greater. It is also said that the practice was formerly general in the Piedmontese army.
The Scandinavian (Sweden, Norway, and Denmark) deep-water
sailors are certainly ninety percent of them tattooed. It is the
tradition among them that the custom is very ancient. One old
sea captain stated that his grandfather, also a sea captain, had told
him the same. Other Scandinavians never use the practice and can
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
. S.,
10 1
1908
very rarely give the Swedish word tatue' ra, for it. Still, one
Swedi h clergyman when a young man had once acted as interpreter in North Sweden when one of the e Arab Gypsies was arrested,
since both knew some German. And he saw a young Swede tattooed by this band. The Gyp ies themselves were all much tattooed and were called by the wedes Ara'p£. He had frequently
seen similar bands giving shows in the country places under the
former King, "who was a jolly old soul and allowed such things
more than now."
It is clear the Gypsies practise this art in Europe only to a
trifling extent. It is not a trade of European Gypsies, except perhaps in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and somewhat in the Balkan
peninsula.
All British sailors practically are tattooed. Such is the universal testimony from exten ive inquiries. It is the rule to write
down in a British consul's book a description of all ailors who vi it
the office, and note and describe all tattoo marks. An inspection
of this book at the Boston office showed only thirty-three percent
tattooed. The vice-consul in charge courteously told me of the devices in the Philippines and Japan where he had been for several years,
and also of the many British soldiers he had seen tattooed in Burmah. In going out I met six sailors in the entrance hall. All were
tattooed, and some most elaborately on arms, chest, back, and legsone by Lee the Philadelphia artist. Like every British sailor I have
found in America they insisted all had some device. They gave as
a reason why so many were not so described in the consul's book:
''They do not like to tell about it." This incident is of little mo ment except as illustrating the fact that such records do not disclose
the real facts. Some of these sailors had been in the East, and
like those of other nations were aware that Gypsies are numerous
and do the tattooing in Egypt and Syria. Several had been tattooed there by them, and exhibited such designs.
Just as nearly all our naval officers are tattooed in Jerusalem or
Japan, so are most of the officers of the British and German and
some other navies. This statement probably does not apply to the
French and Italian officers from my inquiries.
SI CLAIRj
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
Of the American man-of-war's men certainly ninety percent are
tattooed. The same is true of our deep-water sailors, and largely
true of the "coasters " and marines. Landsmen think it makes
"sea-dogs " of them, and soon submit to the practice. One brave
old sea captain, a gallant soldier through our Civil War and orne
years in the navy, was not operated on because, as he laughingly
said, "it hurts too much." Another, a petty officer in the navy, was
not, because when he enlisted a friend showed him a device on his
own arm, and warned him, "My boy, that is the blackguard's mark;
never let them put it on you." A few, for one reason or another,
abstain from the practice. But the custom, example, the ridicule of
shipmates, the anxiety "to show nerve," a a pastime, or something causes nearly all our navy and deep-water sailors to bear orne
tattoo marks. This is true of the British, French, German, Scandinavian, Italian, and most European navies. I have examined the
devices on many hundreds of such sailors, and they always insisted
all have some device.
As to American fishermen, at the present time of those who
sail from Boston, Cape Cod, and vicinity, comparatively few bear
devices. They usually estimate the number at ten percent. It is
not popular with them. Many of those with designs had it done
when on foreign voyages, or coasting. My own inquiries and observations tend to confirm this estimate.
A story is current among the marines "that a millionairess has
offered fifty dollars to any marine who has served two terms of enlistment without being tattooed, and not one yet has been able to
claim the prize."
The ancient Britons were so elaborately covered with devices
pricked into their kins that they abstained from clothing which
would conceal these ornaments. Ccesar and several other Roman authors so state. The ea;ly Chri tians in England bore holy devices to
such an extent that a council in Northumberland, 787 A. D., prohibited
the practice. The old Irish monks tattooed. It has been supposed
by some that British tattooing is a relic of the old custom reinforced
and made popular among sailors by the discovety of the South
Seas and the notoriety of Prince Jolly and other tattooed men
370
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
[ . s.,
10,
1908
exhibited in Eut:ope. Some have thought it was a characteristic of
the Keltic race. It is most common in that part of Italy where
there is the most Keltic blood.
Probably there is more tattooing (apart from sailors) in France
than in any other country in Europe. The French word is tatouage. Large numbers of French soldiers as well as sailors are so
marked. So are a very large proportion of the artisans and mechanics
in Paris and other French cities, and it is a common fashion among the
grisettes. It is also a common practice in the mountainous district of
Auvergne. The charcoal dealers of-Paris are Auvergnats, and are
tattooed. The artisans have· as devices the tools of their trade, as a
butcher, a cleaver and knife crossed; a cooper, a barrel; carpenter,
a saw and hammer, etc. Lacassagne and Lombroso take the view
that it is confined mostly to the criminal classes. These certainly
are prone to it, but my researches convince me that Joest is right
when he states that it is by no means confined to criminals but is
widespread among many others.
How much there is in this theory that tattooing in England,
France, and northern Italy is a survival of an old Keltic custom is
difficult to determine. It may be true.
In Germany, omitting the sailor class, the practice is in most
districts not used. Joest states the same but that in parts of central
and southern Germany a good deal is een on the streets and at the
public baths. I have found that in Saxony, Hessen Cassel, etc.,
very many artisans are tattooed just as in France, and many soldiers;
and that the tradition among them is that it has been handed down
for centuries. Very probably it is an old guild custom. The devices
of the French and German landsmen are coarse, rough, and unattractive. Tiitow irung is the German word; also Tatui1"ung, and
Tiittouirung.
It should be noticed that in Astrakhan Russia the artisans are
also tattooed in the same way with their tools of trade. The custom
seems to be unknown in Russia generally, except among sailors.
The Russian word is tatuirova 1 nzye.
Gl lick thinks that the tattooing of all the Christian girls in a certain
district of Bosnia and Herzegovina with sacred designs may have
originated in the desire of the Catholic clergy to prevent conversion
SINCLAIR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPS}
371
to I lamism. Many of the men, however, also have devices. It
may be a survival of the early Christian custom which has happened
to persist here. In this very region tattooing was a general practice
long before the Christian era, and it may be a relic of this. The
prohibition of the Koran would easily account for it absence among
the Moslems. Still in the whole region and Albania some bear
devices.
Many Spanish sailors I have met were tattooed. The Spanish
words are pintura, picadura, tatuagg e.
There is no apparent influence of the Gypsies on l:!.uropean tattooing, either in patterns, style, or general appearance.
III. -
TATTOOING I
AMERICA
In America the practice appears to be incTeasing. During the
Civil War very few of our soldiers were tattooed. Seventy-five
percent of the 26th U. . Volunteer Infantry, a Massachu etts
regiment, were tattooed, and before they left for the Philippines. In
many large cities, as ew York, Philadelphia, Boston, Portland,
are professional artists who earn their living by tattooing. From
their accounts they have very numerous patrons. Not infrequently
the new papers contain articles on the new "fad" among fa hionable young ladies. Sometimes even the name of ladies high in
the social scale and a sk tch of their tattooed arm are given.
Large numbers are operated upon by electricity in dime museums. vVithin the last sev n years it has become a fashion among
the train men of the Maine Central Railroad. In one small district in Nova Scotia some time ago, nobody was tattooed. An old
sailor came there to live and within a year five hundred men bore
the device of his art. The Vega visited the mouth of the Lena
on the iberian coa t where the natives were astonished at the tattooing on the sailors' arms, an art unknown to them, but which
they much admired. The author describing thi , suggest : "The
next visitors will probably find a tattooed colony here and wonder
if they invented it themselves!" The number in the United States
who do it a boys, or for a lark, or have their name or initials to
identify them, is co_nsiderable, much greater than those suspect who
have not made a careful and extended study.
372
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
[N. s., 10, 1908
The practice is rather growing in the civilized world and certainly is not diminishing in India or the Western Orient. Many
Europeans who visit or live in Japan or Burmah seem captivated by
the artistic work and bring home elaborate designs imprinted on
their bodies. The beauty and elegance of some of this work is
marvelous.
Thirty or forty years ago I saw the celebrated Greek who was
beautifully tattooed in Burmah. His whole body except the soles
of his feet was literally covered with devices, all rather small, but
the minute and accurate details of every figure were wonderful:
serpents, lizards, dragons, birds, flowers, animals, in short almost
every conceivable pattern somewhere. He was exhibiting in Boston
with Barnum's circus. I visited him several times, and had long
talks with him, felt of his arms, legs, body, and did my utmost to
detect the imposture I believed it must be. Then I knew little about
tattooing. I had heard much of Barnum's humbugs, and supposed
this was another. The marvelous story of his captivity by Tartars
with three others, all of whom died under the operation, added to my
susp1c1ons. I remember him well now. He was a rather large,
well-built man who posed on a stand, or barrel, taking artistic postures when the circus orator described his adventures. The orator
always ended his oration with "And he is always much admired by
all the ladies," which was sure to " bring down the house." He
was dressed simply with a breech-cloth, and an immense solitaire
diamond ring which flashed as he gracefully and affectedly handled
a cigarette. His hair was worn in long braids, curled and fastened on
the top of his head. His true history has been given subsequently
by Fletcher, J oest, and others. He evidently had himself tattooed
in Burmah for the purpose of exhibition.
Seven years ago, in studying jugglers' tricks, I met at Austin and
Stone's Museum, Boston, an American juggler and his wife. She
was an Indian woman, born in Indian Territory. Her whole body,
legs, and arms were covered with devices, rather small and of all
sorts. She was exhibited as the most artistic and elaborate work
of the North American Indian ever done ! They had been all over
Europe and the United States, and had learned French and German
abroad. She told me that she had been tattooed for exhibition and
SINCLAIR]
TA TTOOJN G-ORIEN TAL A N D GYPSY
373
that they had been very successful. Her part was to perform Indian jugglers' t ricks and also to pose as an Indian prophetess and
mind-reader! The work was plainly only the best class of the American artists.
IV. -GENERAL
ExTENT OF THE PRACTICE
Tattooing ha a strange fascination for the crowds who frequent
such mu eums, and for the common man ; also for many of the
better and educated classes, a well as savages. This fact, apparent to-day, may explain the wide pread of the practice. Whether
it be the natives at the mouth of the Lena, a quiet ova Scotia
town, Long Branch beach, a large American city, Jerusalem,
Japan, or the Philippines, the civilized man as well as the savage
seems to be fascinated by the idea. It is said that there is no tattooing in Central Asia, and that it was unknown to the ancient
Aryans. It was in vogue among the ancient Chinese and Koreans,
but neither practise it now except in southwestern China and as a
punishment. After the last Taiping insurrection the surviving rebels
were so marked to identify them in ca e of another uprising. The
women in the Chinese island Hainan are elaborately tattooed. The
Chinese have no special word for it, but use lzleil-ng lzttl or kifm-do' t
picture, szzt-nti, hand mark, etc. They say it is "bad 1uck."
Some Chinese books state that when the Chinese first visited
The pictures
Japan it was inhabited by "tattooed savages."
of the old mythical Japanese heroes often represent them as
tattooed. The Geisha girls were formerly all tattooed, but none
of them are now. Groom , jinriksha men, and some others of
the lower cla ses in Japan did tattoo, and do at the present time,
perhaps not so much as formerly, but still the practice is very common in spite of the efforts of the government to stop it. The common Japanese word is Ito' rz-1nif no, carving mark. Bunslzt n, another
word, reminds one of the old Chinese word venclzin, or ven;i·n, tattooed-man.
The Aino, the supposed aborigines of Japan, employ the practice. All the married women have a moustache, and the lips blue
and other devices. Many of the men also bear designs.
It was the universal custom among the Tu ngus, Koryaks,
374
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
[N. S., 10, 190~
Chukchi, and Siberian Eskimo. It was common, at least, in Saghalin and Kamchatka, and universal across the Aleutian islands,
King island, and the Diomedes, and among all the Eskimo to
Greenland. To some extent at least, it was general among nearly
all the tribes of North America. It existed on the Isthmus, in
Mexico and the Antilles, was in "full swing" in ancient Yucatan,
and was practised in ancient Peru, and by very many tribes all over
South America, even in Patagonia. Among some tribes of both
North and South America it is certain that the whole body was
universally covered with elaborate designs.
Probably the old Japanese were all tattooed. At all events we
find in Japan today the art elaborate and elegant. Going south
to Formosa the bodies of all Formosan belles are most beautifully
embroidered with artistic designs- flowers, fishes, etc. The highly
developed state of the art was univer al certainly among the men
in Burmah and Siam, and at least very common in Annam. Among
some Philippine tribes it was and is elaborate. The thousands of
Pacific islanders tattoo. All the Polynesian tongues stretching
from Madagascar to the Sandwich islands have one origin. The
canoe voyagers starting from Farther India gradually extended their
voyages from one island to another as far as Easter island and
Hawaii. Did they sail beyond? They took their language with
them, and many evidences tend to show the custom of tattooing.
The English word tattoo is derived from the Polynesian word
tatau, common to all the dialects. The root ta means tt to strike."
By a common rule of Polynesian frequentative reduplication this
becomes tata. The syllable u, which conveys the idea of pricking,
is added, making tatau. Often another ta is prefixed to distinguish
it from a word tatau having a different significance. So we have
tatatau, or tatau =our tattoo, which first appeared in English in
Captain Cook's Voyages, I 770. He seems not to have known this
word before he heard it in the Pacific, but employed the term " pricking." He spelled it u tattow," which he may have pronounced o,
or au, hardly u ( oo ). , The word tabu, or taboo, came with it. During the operation a man was under tabu. These two are said to be
the only Polynesian words in the English language. Since, this
word tattoo has been adopted in many other European tongues.
SINCLAIR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
375
In Natchez and Muskhogee ta also means u to strike." The
English word tattoo (but with a different origin) is used for the
taps· of a drum. In some Polynesian dialects tata becomes ta' a,
almost exactly the Arabic da' a, the root of which is " striking."
This Arab din at'ud becomes in Spanish laztd, in English lute.
There can be no possible connection between these languages.
The example however illustrates the danger of drawing inferences
of a common origin from coincidences of words, customs, etc.
The Melanesian tongues are supposed by some to have the
same origin as the Polynesian. The Papuan and Australian are
plainly from a different source.
In the Australian the skin is so dark that tattooing does not
show well, therefore the practice of raised scars (manka, akotto)
was employed, and was elaborate, but coarse, and ·universal. The
Papuans (New Guinea) use both forms, color and scars (cicatrices),
and both are generally and largely practised.
Some of the minute Papuan devices which form the larger designs are identical with those of distant Polynesian islands. The
Australian word akotto, or kotto, is also found as the name of Polynesian tattooing, where the instrument is also called k otto.
The elegant and universal New Zealand form was termed moko.
The art was highly developed and in general use in Borneo. It is
said that in Java and Sumatra, where the native skins ate very
dark, no form of tattooing is practised.
The custom in some of its forms is or has been general, and
with a very large number of peoples universal all over Africa.
When the skins are too dark to show colors, scarification is used.
Tattooing popularly and often in literature includes penetration of
the skin by cuts or burns, without dyes as well as with them, and
is a convenient general term for the four methods : pricking or
scarring in indelible ink, soot, etc., both of which leave the
skin smooth; inserting these in cuts, as in New Zealand, thus
making a rough surface; and the raised scars of Australia kept
open for months by irritating substances, earth, etc., so as to leave
finally a wide elevated scar one quarter inch high or more. All
along the northern coast of Africa- Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers, and
in Morocco -the practice is almost as general as in Egypt. So it
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
. s.,
10, 1908
is in Abys inia, the Galla country, Soudan, all through the heart
of Africa. Even among the Boers and Zulus in South Africa, who
call it s!tat"a, there is a very large use of the practice. The Zulu
laborers seen in Cape Town have from one to three gashes several
inches long on their cheeks. These are said to be tribe marks .
A few only of the most savage, remote, and degraded tribes are
reported without the custom.
The extent of the practice in India has not generally been under tood. Account of the Nilgherry Hill tribes have been published, showing elaborate designs, and that all women must be
marked; and also about some other half-savage tribes in India.
But educated Europeans who have lived there do not seem to be
aware of the fact that tattooing is general. My investigations 'and
inquiries from many Hindus and Europeans of the poorer orders
who grew up there as boys led me to think such was the fact among
women of the lower classes. Recently I have received a printed
letter, apparently part of some publication. It begins: "Indian
Museum, Calcutta, Jan. 31, 1908. Under instructions from Sir
Herbert Risley I send you the information you ask in your letter
of Aug. I sth, la t." The first two and one-half quarto pages are
devoted to mu ical in truments, referring also to accompanying
photographs ; the rest of the letter to tattooing. The following is
a brief quotation : " Your informants are correct in stating that
tatuing is practi ed in all quarters of India, among the lower
clas e . I may add it has filtered among the higher classes, too.
It is only an infinitesimal portion of the educated men of India who
have been inducing their fair sex to give up the practice. The
tribe, the caste, the religious sect, and the profession of the wearer
of the mark can often be traced from the symbol selected. Many
again are charms; sympathetic magic also plays an important part
in the selection of these drawings. For instance, the mark of a
scorpion protects one from the bite of that vermin, and a snake
from that of a cobra, and so forth. Among the Burmese gunshots are tatued to protect from fire-arms ! A Shan thinks he
acquire agility by tatuing a cat, or tiger, on his body. The tatuer
is often a woman, a professional herbalist, known as Vaz'du in
Bombay."
SINCL IR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPS J
377
The letter i signed ''B. A. Gupte, Assistant Director of Ethnography for India," who states: "I am a Hindu of Bombay," and
has attached to it nine immense sheets covered with unpubli bed
copies made by him of tattoo marks, and several important monographs. He also states "Sir. Herbert wrote you in his letter of 28th
August, I 902, that as Director of Ethnography for India he started
an enquiry into this subject. The result now is that a large collection of tatu marks has been made by Mr Rose in the Punjab,
Capt. Bannerman in Rajputana, Major Luard in Central India, Khan
Bahadur Dallal in Baroda, and by me in Bombay, Ootacamund,
Vindhyachal, R aichur, and other places." This letter indicates what
is perhaps true of much Oriental tattooing everywhere. Some
charm, superstition, hope, myth, or something is connected with the
devices, especially those on women.
What I have already stated as to the extent of the practice in
Persia is confirmed by a letter just received from Major P. Molesworth Sykes, Meshed, Persia. He writes : "Apparently all Persian
women are tattooed," and "that he will investigate more fuliy later
on."
Moslems of the Punjab have told me that the Mohammedans of
that district and Afghanistan do not tattoo because it is contrary to
the Koran. Even in Calcutta nearly all the women of the lower
classes are tattooed, and professional tattooers are numerous. These
frequently board foreign vessels and operate on the sailors. Some
of this work I have examined and it is very well done. On one
short street in Calcutta, thirty years ago, were thirteen rude bamboo
houses much frequented by such sailors for amusement. Among
the other inmates were always found, in every house, two or three
of these tattoo -experts teady to imprint devices on the visiting seafarers. The Hindu words I have heard for tattoo are godna, cltap,
pa/ clmz, da' ga; the Afghan word dag, da' ka; the Persian, ' ghali
(1/ali), kluil, dctga, dag. The lexicons contain other words also.
Shake peare' s H industani Dictionary gives " chhapa, sectarial marks
repre enting a lotu , trident, etc., delineated on the body by the
Vaishnavas, or worshippers of Vishnu "; "stamp, print."
This hasty general survey discloses some facts important to
notice. First that there is an immense territory filled with hunA 1. ANTH ., N .
s.,g-25
A llfERICAN A !VTHROPOLOGI. T
( ' · S. 1 101 1908
dreds of million of people most if not nearly a!l of whom are tattooed, viz, India, Per ia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Egypt; and the
cu tom reache back to the highest antiquity. From this district
it is traced step by step in contiguou countries, or those eparated
only by seas, over Farther India, all the outh eas, Australia,
Cochin China, China, Japan, northeastern Asia, across Bering
strait, the Aleutian islands, all over orth and South America, the
Antille , and all over Africa and Europe.
Secondly, it is everywhere practically the same art. Details in designs and proce ses may differ. The different peoples simply use the
mo t convenient tools for them-what each has, whether steel needles,
bamboo needle , fish or bird bones, cactus spines, knives, etc. The
dyes everywhere are about the same : oot is the most common,
charcoal, India ink, for black; cinnabar for red.
orne word for
striking, tapping, is the word for the mark and process very generally.
There are many little details, as tying the needles together, she ts
of pattern , method of work, common in widely distant regions,
and so with de ices. The many similarities are so striking often as
to prove a common origin. One fagot can be easily broken, but a
bundle cannot.
Wuttke 1 makes the remark : " o one would be willing to
assert that the _custom of tattooing is omething natural and evolved
of itself, and on this ground it is general. . . . Its origin was in
the earlie t, oldest times of the human race, before the wide dispersion of man."
His masterly work considered all forms of expressing ideas by
mark , knot , paint, pictographs, hieroglyphics, etc., except written alphabet , embracing the whole known world. The conclu ion
of such a agacious, keen, learned scholar on such a subject has
weight. Hi chapters on our subject are unsurpassed.
Any attempt to di cuss adequately such points and any details
is impo sible in this paper. During my Oriental studies for years
one thing has impressed me: the easy mean by which mu ical
instruments, game , tricks, etc., and particularly tattooing, can be
and has been spread. I have found a very large number of instances
of borrowing when at first sight thi seemed impossible. But I
I
D ie E nstehu ng der S ch?'ift, p. 96.
SI CLAIR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL A D GYPSY
.
379
have never learned of a single ca e in which tattooing wa clearly
an independent invention.
V.
-DEVIC
The religiou d vices in Jerusalem are varied, as t George on
horseback with a long pear, the vanqui hed drag non the ground
before him ; Chri t on the Cros ; a copy of the ilver crucifix v orn
by Greek prie ts; the Virgin Mary holding the infant J us; eter
and the crowing cock;
reek churches, candelabra, incen s 1 mps,
eros es; the infant Je us with angel gazing on him from the cloud ,
and a great variety of other Biblical subject . The name or initials,
and date of pilgrimage are added.
ften both arm and hand are
covered with several such patterns according to the wi he of the
pilgrim, and the remuneration.
The e religious devices are in imitation of a very ancient practice. It wa forbidden in Lev. IX, 28 : "Ye hall not make any
cuttings in your fie h for the dead, nor print any mark up n you."
Isaiah XLIX, I6: "I have graven thee on th palm of my hand ."
Cutting the fie h was a common mode of ex pre ing grief, ranger,
just as it is in the South ea and among our Indian today. It is
mentioned as a cu tom in I Kings, XVIH, 28. The prie t of Baal
cut themselves "with knives and lancets until the blo d gu bed ut
upon them." So Jeremiah, XVI, 6; XLI, 5 ; XLVII, 5 . ' L III, 37;
Lev. XXI, 5 ; Deut. XIV, I. St Paul wrote (Gal. VI, I 7) : 11 From
henceforth let no man trouble me, for I bear on my body the mark
of the Lord Jesu ." Rev. XIII, I 6, I 7 : " ... a mark on their
right hand, or on their foreheads."
The Phenician worshippers of the Moon god de had consecration
mark imprinted on their necks and wrists. The ·early hristians
followed the practice, some claiming miraculou devic s. The
early estorian missionaries carried the custom with them to China.
In 72 5 A. . the Arabs compelled every Copt monk to wear n hi
right hand the mark of a lion, or it was cut off.
oon ev ry
pt
bore this device. The Emperor Theophilus tattooed the [I rch ad
of two Christian martyrs with ribald verses.
The tattooing at Loreto is probably a relic of thi old religi u
cu tom. The pilgrims devote themselve to the anta Donna,
AMERiCA N ANTHROPOLOGIS T
[
. S., 101 1908
hence the word for their devices, devozio1Ze. The myth as told me
is that the acred image was transported with the Sa1Zta Casa
(chapel) through the air from Egypt (some said yria) by an army
of angels to Loreto (from Law-eta) near Ancona. The e images
are sold everywhere in Italy and alway with a black face like the
Madonna. Thousands make the pilgrimage from all parts of the
country every year, e pecially in September, when the railroads
reduce fares to one third. Many go on foot, and barefooted, a
more devotional. All are tattooed there with pious symbols and
by old women who are found in booth or little shops. Many
miraculous cures are believed to be wrought at this shrine.
The word "cro s" is applied to the sacred tattooing in Bosnia.
Here also is a famous shrine, which by tradition wa carried by
angel over the river to escape the Turks, and back again when
they retired. All the Catholic girls in parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina are elaborately tattooed on Sundays in the churchyard with
religious symbols elegantly done, and by a Gypsy-like class of
women.
All these simple pilgrims and people seem to feel as St Paul
did, that they bear on their bodies the "marks of Christ." They
regard them with reverence and comfort, and some a a protection.
The ordinary patterns in the Western Orient are trees, ftmvers,
leave , wreaths, swords, imitars, daggers (often piercing a heart
and drop of blood as seen on the walls of Pompeii), knives,
crescents, star , dots, all kinds of animals, fishes, one figure a fish
with mouth open ready to catch a worm-bait, arrows, wreaths,
garland , bracelets, geometrical figures, lines, crosses, circle , etc.
Moslem women often have forehead, temples, cheeks, chin, lips,
breasts, abdomen, arms, legs, and back much tattooed: lines on the
lips and chin, a star on each breast, in the center a date-palm tree,
emblem of fertility. Several Syrian ladies of Tripoli informed me
that all the Mo lem women there of the lower classes had these
vertical lines on the chin, one at each corner of the mouth and one
in the center. Wuttke calls attention to these same three lines
on the chins of E gyptian women and Eskimo women.
A few years ago many negro slave women in yria and Turkey
bore three huge gashes on each cheek, their only marks.
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
SI CLAIR]
Persian women have marks on forehead, star on temple, devices
on back of hands, and on arm , brea t , calves, such as bird ,
garlands of flowers, violet wreaths around navel,. etc.
The wive of Luri Kurdish chief: are tattooed with fronds on
the throat, three stars on the chin, one in the center of the forehead, and other devices on hands, arms, and body.
Mr Bishop, 1 speaking of the Bagdad district, r mark : "All
Bedouin women are tattooed. There are arti t. here who live by
tattooing. Flower on the bo om linked by a blue chain, palm
frond on throat, tars on brow and chin, bands around the wrists
and ankle ." The e arti ts are Gypsies, who are also the people's
doctors in Baa-dad. They are e n at regular easons in the market
places with their herbs and remedie pread out before them, or
peddling these about the street . The. people there have great
faith in these Gypsy healer and wait for their arrival.
ften th y
treat certain troubles by burning the kin with a hot nail, or an
iron, which leaves a car. So the Arab dancing-girl cia s burn
their skin in variou ·parts of the body with cigarettes. Hence many
Arabs have scars. Often Syrians burn the top of the head for weak
eye , and o many show scars there an inch or more in diameter.
Curiously the e same cars are very common in the arne pot
among the tribes of Kafiristan, and made for the same reason. The
trade ign of the Egyptian Gyp y dancing-girl is three round spots
on the chin, forming a triangle. In Per ia, in addition to those
already mentioned, the sun, sunbeams, lions, are favorite devices.
Mo t Gypsy tattooing is arti tic and well done, some of it beautifully.
The religi us device at Loreto Italy, and in Bo nia al o how
fine work. Those in Bo nia are probably made by Gyp ie . With
the e exceptions all " uropean de igns ar een at a glance to be
inferior to those of the Oriental Gypsy. Much of it is extremely
coar e and unattractiv . The most elegant work i done in Japan
and Burmah.
ext come the Marquesas, amoa, Iew Z aland,
and other outh Sea i lands. That of the Haida Indian of Qu en
Charlotte i land is elaborate, and finely wrought, by far the best
of any in the America . There are certain peculiarities and char1 Persia,
vol.
T,
p. 34·
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
' (N. S., IO,
1908
acteri tics in different districts, not only in pattern but in other particulars - the parts of the body marked, and the general appearance
and impression of the whole work, which are noticeable.
The tattooing of the Western Orient that is done by Gypsies
all is similar and has the same general character. It is distinctly
different from the work elsewhere in the Far East as well as in
Europe and America, although all may and do have some simple
figures the same, and in the same spot on the body, as a round spot
on the forehead, three vertical lines on the chin, etc.
The ' ork of Burmah, Siam, Hainan, and Formosa, sugge t that
of Japan. That in most of the outh ea i lands has many peculiarities in designs a well as otherwise which make a common origin
certain. Haida tattooing suggests in figure and character that of
some of the Polynesian islands, -the broad lines, split fishes, reptiles, birds, etc.,- and also reminds of the old Mexican art. It is
by no means sure that a careful, patient study of the ubjectwork, details, process, figure , myth , meaning of devices, parts of
body, etc., would not shed light on interesting and puzzling questions.
VI. - ME NJNG
It has often been said in regard to the tattooing of the outh
Seas that every mark, every device has a name and a meaning.
This is undoubtedly true, and al o as to their body painting. Some
of these name and meanings are known, but to learn and understand them all or many of th~m is here, as everywhere, a difficult
task requiring time, opportunity, equipment, and long patient study.
The ignificance of many handed down for centuries, or borrowed,
has been lost, but there is enough left to repay careful scrutiny.
These primitive savages have retained such meanings to an extent
that a consideration of them here may present uggestions elsewhere.
Certain patterns indicate rank, title, position. slaves, subjects,
tribe, societies, clubs, name signature (as moko), warlike deeds,
number of enemies or whales killed, maturity of girls and boys, occupation- as whaler, house-builder, dancer, tattooer, priest- danceplace building, household work, warrior, adopted brotherhood,
married women, a social fea t, husband's achievements, children,
signs of mourning, marks for the dead, brand of disgrace or crime,
SINCLAIR ]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
charms against evil spirits, serpents, animals, reptiles, insects- to
make invisible to an enemy, render him powerless, or terrify himmoustaches, beard , the un (concentric circles) ; to captivate the
other sex, not subject to "tabu," a magical or upernatural power,
etc.
The same devices are often seen in house and other post ,
canoes, weapons, utensils, etc.
There are small, often minute, devices of various kinds which
are employed to outline and fill up larger compound designs. The
simple marks are straight lines, stripes varying in width ; curved,
wavy, zigzag, winding lines; spirals, volute , triangles, hooks,
bands, circles, emicircles, horse hoe , T's, Y' , feather edges, sawteeth edges, minute star , dots, two or three parallel lines, etc.
The compound figures are fishes, reptile , fabulous birds, dragons, demons, men, plants, foliage, trees, tortoises, animals, insects,
feather , leave , teeth, magic knot , geometrical figures, flowers,
rings, bracelets, anklets, necklaces, moustaches, beards, horns, nets,
ladders, ·grates, crosse , round spots, concentric circles often with
cross line , parallel lines,. stars of various styles, diamonds, squares,
rectangle , checker-boards, rosettes, breast-plates, etc.
Sometimes on islands where everybody is elaborately covered,
some, as the priests, have only one small rectangle over the right
eye. The most minute mark therefore should always be noted.
A few examples must suffice here. Some of the best illustrations of meaning are found in a recent wor~, Dreissig jaltre i1t der
S udsee, by R. Parkinson, edited by Dr B. Ankerman, 1907. Painting of the body i a widespread custom, by many thought to be the
forerunner of tattooing, which is merely the pricking in of color to
make it permanent. The natives of the Gazelle peninsula, N euPommern, often paint the face with soot mixed with oil. This soot
i the same and made from the same nut a that used in tattooing.
The whole subject of body paint is intimately connected with the
latter and deserves an article by itself.
A certain stripe on the right breast, shoulder, and arm is called
-meme, 11 lightning." It gives the warrior' arm a surer aim. The
whole lower face black is pap, 11 hound, " and causes the pursued
enemy to stumble in fright and to fall when he hears the pursuer
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
[N. S., 10, 1908
breathing loud like a hunting dog. A black ring round the right
eye and a red one round the left is kotkot, "crow." One pattern
is called m:inigulai, ' hawk," and both are believed to give certain
powers to the wearer . Their painting is elaborate, and " every
stripe and spot has a name and signification." Tattooing does not
show well on their dark brown skin, and plays a small role. So the
artistic warrior wig, called wardodo, or ka ai 1. ai, enables the ~arrior
to approach his victims un een.
The faces and parts of the bodies of an assemblage of dancers
who take part in many festivities in India and Farther India are
often painted in an extraordinary manner.
In Persia the ladies "paint and fix themselves up in all the even
colors of the rainbow," as they express it. The practice has by
no means dif;appeared in the civilized world, where rouge and blanc
and a tiny black patch are by no means rare. The black patch
would seem to be the same as that of the Persian belle , who call.
it a ''mole.'' The Persian word k!tal (mole) is a common name for
tattoo mark.
The tattooing, feather head-dresses, body painting, dances, elegantly made and engraved round shell gorgets, the shell money
and basketry of some Pacific i lands, are a fascinating study for one
interested in the North American Indians. The first superficial
reading of Parkinson and other works often surprise by similarities
in all these subjects. A connection between the two seems impossible, but all are worthy of careful study. The resemblance are
more striking and greater than in the same things in Africa.
Almost everything among these islanders seems to be a charm,
have magic power, or be intimately bound up with mysticism and
the supernatural.
J oest, Kubary, Parkinson, and others are inclined to the view
that tattooing is not religious but simply esthetic, ornament, to
please the other sex. They would seem to be right as to the
punialo ("pond to catch fish") on the abdomen of the Samoan
women, and the fa' a' upega, " fish net" on the same place on men.
Both are large elaborate figures.
Joest (Kubary), p. 86, describes the operation on Nukahiva
girls at maturity. Groups of five or ten girls pass three months in
SIN LAIR]
TATTOOING-ORIENTAL AND GYPSY
temples before it is done. On the appointed day the operator, on
the beach before the whole village people, quickly makes the triangle
on her person. The priest who superintends covers the parts with
three stones, and her brea ts with a triangular tortoise-shell covering. After three days the drawing heals and she can leave the
temple. Then follow races, wrestling, festivities, etc.
All this can hardly be denominated mere ornament, and the
larger part of the Pacific designs seem to confirm the opinion of
Wuttke and other that they are much more than esthetic.
The triangle is an exceedingly common figure, both in small
and large designs. The Radak islanders have a triangle, point at
navel, then aero s the breast, and the other two points at the
shoulders, etc.
The Sandwich islands and Tahiti both had the same large ba ket pattern design. The tattoo implements of Tahiti and Samoa,
thirteen hundred miles apart, are exactly the same. The peculiar
appearance given the Papuan girls by a certain use of a small line
is duplicated in the eu-Pommern districts. Scarification, found
among the Maori and Marquesas, is in the re t of Poly~e ia occupied by the ornamental moxa scars. A part of the dried rib of a
coconut leaf, a quarter of an inch long, is inserted into the skin.
The free end is lighted and blown out just as the flame reaches the
skin. The remnant is consumed as a glowing ember and leave a
scar. These are arranged in various ornamental lines.
A design consisting of two rows of saw-teeth on long lines, one
superimposed on the other, is common in amoa, and al o is
found on the pears in New Hannover; it probably mean "whalediver."
Pelau is distant from Samoa forty-four hundred miles, yet a
large number of the small marks, particularly those which make up
the larger drawing , are the same, and they are too numerous to
be accidental. Inspection at once hov s this.
Co rcLu ro '
In order to tudy the subject carefully, to make comparisons and
draw correct inferences, certain details are important: (a) The percentage of people tattooed, and of each sex. (b) Many or few devices
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST
[N. S., 10l 1908
on each person. (c) On what parts of the body. (d) General descriptions of the marks, simple and compound. (e) The meaning of each and whether religious, ceremonial, tribal, sacrificial; showing marriage, puberty, rank, warlike or other achievement, servitude, disgrace, a charm again t disease, evil spirits,
wounds, etc., a trade mark, or to fascinate the other sex, to insure
a good husband, children, ornament, etc. (f) The native words
for tattoo, and the various marks and their significance. (g) Antiq ·
uity of the practice; if borrowed, when and whence. (lz) Traditions
and myths about the origin, meaning, use. (i) Description of the
process, and ceremonies, if any. (j) Are the same devices found
on pottery, skins, canoes, implements, weapons, trees, posts, houses,
rocks, etc. (k) Time, patience, the confidence of natives, and inquiries of many willing to talk are needed.
It is impossible to treat the questions here except in a general
way and to make suggestions. The subject is a large one which will
repay thorough study and careful thought. The most impressive
point, perhaps, is that the art is spread over nearly the whole of the
known world and is similar everywhere. As Wuttke (p. 96) so well
expresses it, " In the execution and devices noticeable agreements
occur which, as well as the variations, might be accidental. The
amazing sameness in the essential part (Hauptsache) remains."
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:Journal of Amt .. ·tJ,·can Folk-Lore.
16
Gypsy and Oriental Music.
GYPSY AND ORIENTAL MUSIC.
ALL Hungarian musicians are Gypsies. All Hungarian music is
simply Gypsy music. Liszt states this, and it is true. The statements can be applied to R,umania and Bessarabia with almost as
much truth as to Hungary. It is the same in Bulgaria, European
Turkey, and the whole Balkan peninsula. Although the Slavs themselves are a musical people, yet in Servia, Herzegovina, Bosnia, and
Croatia the Gypsy musicians and music are as popular as in Hungary. Everywhere are seen the Gypsy bands and the Gypsy bagpiper, playing in the centre of a circle of Slavs dancing the K6lo
around him.
The intense love of the Russians for their Gypsy singers and choruses is well known. They are found all over Russia, while in Little
and Southern Russia we find Gypsy musicians much like those in
Hungary and Rumania.
In Spain are 50,000 Gypsies. Many of them are musicians,
singers, and dancers. Some are famous for their accomplishments,
and become rich in their professions. Most of the bull-fighters are
Gypsies.
All the public musicians, singers, and dancers in Persia are Gypsies called there Karachi (~f;IS), Liilf
..
'
(~. '.:"~), etc.
(j,_J), Luri
..
(~),J), Miltr'ib
..
This statement is also true of Syria, Mesopotamia,
and Egypt, where various names are applied to them, NGri (~;~ ),
pl.
N~war 0~),
1;awizi
(~2f;), 'Alrmah (~~),pl. 'Awillm(~f;),
etc.
I do not intend to include the religious and military music, or that
of the poets and rhapsodists. In Egypt and Syria also are a few
male performers not Gypsies, and in recent years foreign music and
musicians are sometimes heard in the larger cities.
Still in all these Oriental countries people are extremely fond of
music. In every house is found some musical instrument, a lute
("_,..cJf),
al'ud, a tambourine, castanets, a hand drum, etc.
All the
girls and women sing, play, and dance, but only at home. The boys
and men too often take part in these pastimes.
The Gypsies number in Egypt about 40,000, in Asiatic Turkey
6o,ooo, and, according to Major Sykes ("Ten Thousand Miles in
Persia," p. 438), roo,ooo in Persia. In Hungary and the Balkan
peninsula are soo,ooo Gypsies, and in the rest of Europe roo,ooo.
Although not numerous in Turkestan (5000), Beluchistan (zooo),
and Afghanistan, in all music, song, and the dance is one of their
principal occupations.
Th·e re is another prominent trade of the Gypsies in the Orient
which should be considered in connection with this subject. It is
the trade of showme1z. In Persia, Turkestan, Syria, Mesopotamia,
and Egypt all the athletes, acrobats, slight-of-hand performers, tightrope dancers, men with performing animals (bears, donkeys, goats,
dogs, monkeys), and Punch and Judy shows, snake-charmers and
snake-catchers, are Gypsies. These countries have no theatres, no
concert halls, no circuses. The Gypsy showmen take the place of
these, and they are very popular and numerous.
When the rude Arabs conquered Persia in the seventh century
they found a music highly developed. They took this back with
them to Syria, Egypt, and along the north coast of Africa to Spain.
With them also went bowed instruments, as the rebib, which spread
into Europe and became the origin of our violin. Did the Gypsies
go with them? What influence have the Gypsies had upon and in
introducing musical instruments into the various countries where
Gypsies are now found, and into Europe? These are most interesting questions.
What has been stated above shows what an important role the
Gypsies play in the field of music, song, and the dance, not only in
the western part of the Orient, but also in Europe.
Under Darius the Great the vast Persian Empire stretched from
the Oxus to the Persian Gulf; from the Indus to the Mediterranean.
It included Thrace, Macedonia, and Egypt. This whole territory
was rich, populous, and filled with peoples sensuous, devoted to pleasure, fond of music, singing, and dancing. Then and ever since
there have been in this whole territory a Gypsy-like class of musicians, dancers, singers, showmen just like the Gypsies now there.
Alexander's general captured with the harem of Darius 329 dancers
and singers. The description by Herodotus of the music, dancing,
and merriment down the Nile to and at the festival of Bubastis
would be a most excellent description of the religious festivals and
fairs (like Tanta) in Egypt to-day. Everybody goes for the fun, the
revelry, the music, the showmen, the singing and dancing girls.
When did this old cast of musicians and dancers die out entirely,
and the present Gypsies monopolize their place?
For several years I have been endeavoring to consider these problems and compare the Gypsy music in different countries with one
another, and also with Arab and Persian music, and likewise certain
characteristic Gypsy musical instruments.
The music of the Hungarian Gypsies I have been fascinated by,
VOL. XX. -
NO.
76.
2
18
:Journal of Amerz'can Folk-Lore.
day after day and evening after evening, and for months at a time,
in Hungary. Here they play it with a devotion, a fire, a passion, a
love not heard anywhere else. They are the national musicians of
Hungary, admired and petted. One evening (the 30th of December)
I heard such an orchestra perform at my hotel. The next evening
was New Year's eve. On the heights of Ofen in the old castle in
Buda was held the grand annual ball of the Emperor and the most
aristocratic court in Europe. All the beauties and the magnates and
nobility of Hungary were there. So was the Gypsy orchestra, who
played the night before at the Jager horn. No court ball is ever held
in Hungary without one of their Gypsy bands. Every little village
has one. For every marriage, dance, or feast, the band is called in,
and this means simply the Gypsies.
Gypsy music has been developed by the Hungarian Gypsies to a
higher state of perfection, both in their compositions and execution, than anywhere else in the world. Conditions here have
favored them more than elsewhere. Here their music is now soft,
sweet, weird, wailing, and now bursting forth suddenly in the fierce,
wild, fiery strains of a battle song or Csardas. As a vocal art, music
is but little cultivated by them as it is in Russia, Spain, and the
Orient. Many of the violinists equal in technique the best violin
virtuosos. Some of the most famous violin performers have been
Gypsies, as Remenyi.
-,
,
The Russian Gypsy songs like "Ochi charnlya," "Black eyes," are
sung by everybody in Moscow. Here in Gypsy music and songs we
less often hear the fiery, warlike character of the Hungarian. Still
in the midnight revels of the aristocratic Russian bloods the singing
and dancing of the Gypsy performers grow wild and furious.
In southern Russia, Rumania, and the Slav countries south of
the Danube their music is quieter and less wild.
Still everywhere in Europe to my ear there are certain peculiar
characteristics common to Gypsy music, and also common to Persian
and Arab music. I say, to my ear, for I find the subject has been
but little investigated, so far as known.
So it seems to me there are certain peculiarities of body movements, steps, and rhythm common to Gypsy dances, Spanish dances
of the bolero kind, the South Italian tarantella, and the Oriental
dances of Egypt and Western Asia.
To describe such characteristics exactly by words is exceedingly
difficult. Musicians can at once distinguish French, Italian, German,
Spanish, English, Scotch music. All are much more similar to one
another than to Gypsy or Oriental music. The general impression
and effect of these last two are a very important element in deciding
upon similarities.
Gypsy and Orz'ental Mus£c.
Then there is an absence of modulation, peculiar intervals we do
not use, characteristic rhythms, elaborate ornamentation, quarter
tones, common to both and absent in our music; so great variety
and sudden changes and transitions in time and rhythm, and from
one note to another very distant. Then the unusual extreme prolongation of tones in songs by Russian Gypsies and others is one of
the most extraordinary and striking features of Persian and Arab
singers. Europeans have nothing like it. They execute the Oriental
trill on one note, embellish
it with most florid ornamentations' turns,
.
grace notes, arpeggws, using quarter tones, with a most striking
effect. Such notes at times seem to be held for minutes · so with
Oriental lute-players and other musicians, it is these wond~rful and
complicated embellishments which delight their hearers as much as,
or perhaps often more than, the melodies themselves.
The ornamentation of the Hungarian Gypsies is so luxuriant as
to distract attention from the airs. It is like a vigorous tree, covered by a thick foliage and with beautiful vines and flowering and
creeping plants which nearly conceal even the trunk itself from view.
The theme is there. It is in itself grand and impressive, but it is
sometimes entirely covered up by the richest and most beautiful
fioritures, musical vines and flowers.
The two leading instruments of Hungarian Gypsy orchestras are
the violin and tzim bal. Generally the violin plays the melody, but often
also the tzimbal. All the other instruments, second violin, viola, 'cello,
and contra-bass, simply support these. The tzimbal itself is played
with wonderful dexterity and the rapidity of a prestidigateur. The
tzimbal-player will not only perform the air, but at the same time an
accompaniment, as if by several instruments. With his hammers,
one in each hand, he strikes one note after another so rapidly as to
produce the effect of full chords, and all sorts of embellishments as
arpeggios, trills, turns, etc. The effect of all these instruments supporting the leading violin is peculiar. He turns to them, starts up
a strain to indicate the piece to be played, and they all at once take
up the strain and follow him. His improvisations are most intricate
and elaborate. Yet they harmonize with him, often with many embellishments themselves, particularly the tzimbal, which is always
most elaborate in its performances.
But there is always perfect harmony and the most fascinating and
beautiful and fantastic musical effects. Sometimes the European
cultivated musician suspects discords or even mistakes in execution.
But there are none. All he notices are musical effects new to him ,
just as he finds them in all Oriental music.
Exactly in what the harmony of the Gypsies consists and what
it is, are often very difficult to discover. Perhaps other i~struments
20
'Journal of A mer£can Folk-Lore.
than the violin are, so to speak, playing melodies of their own which
harmonize with the principal air.
So it is with Oriental music. Its harmony, or what takes the place
of harmony, performed by the accompanying instruments, is a most
difficult subject to consider.
Such matters require a long, patient, and careful study under
favorable circumstances by scientists thoroughly competent, enthusiasts, and well equipped for the task. Nobody appears ever to have
gone into the subject in that way.
Even Liszt, scholar, great composer, and pianist, as he was, who
had made a life study of Gypsy music, did not succeed in unravelling
such questions. It was his view that Gypsy music clearly was from
the Orient, and that a careful investigation of Hindu and Arab music
would conclusively prove this to be the case.
Hungarian Gypsies employ various scales or modes not used in
our music ; for example, C, D, Et~, F#, G, Al7, B, c. They employ
in the minor scale the augmented fourth, the diminished sixth, and
the augmented seventh. Frequently also they use the diminished
seventh and the dominant with an augmented fifth. Arab music
contains these same peculiarities.
The common impression in Europe is that Arabic music is discordant and unattractive. There are several reasons for this view.
One is that Europeans rarely hear good Oriental music.
The music of the Dervishes at Kara Hissar is most beautiful ;
simply flutes and voices. L ane ("Manners and Customs of the
Modern Egyptians") states that the singing of some of the Egyptian
Almehs was the most beautiful music he ever heard. The Muezzin's
Call to Prayer in the same book is often copied and admired. Arab
music has appealed to some of the greatest composers, who have
elaborated it in some of their finest works. As examples can be
mentioned: Mozart's "Seraglio," some of his opera "l'Oca del
Cairo," the "Alia Turca" of his piano sonata in A major; Beethoven's "Ruins of Athens," with its Turkish march and dance of Dervishes; Von Weber's opera "Oberon;" Cherubini's "Abencereges
and Ali Baba; '' Boieldieu's "Caliph of Bagdad;" Glinka's opera,
"Ruslan and Ludmila," third act Persian Gypsy music; Rubenstein's
twelve Persian Gypsy songs; Meyerbeer in "Les Huguenots."
Felicien David's "Le Desert" is characteristic Arab music, elaborated from melodies he heard on his journey with a caravan from
Cairo to Algiers. . These Arab airs are sweet, melodious, beautiful,
?rand. I cannot refer to a better collection as illustrating my meanmg, and I know by hearing them that very many of the Arab and
other Oriental melodies are as beautiful as these.
Very little is known to Europeans about Arab music or its system.
Gypsy and Or£ental Mus£c.
21
Exactly what the Arab scale and modes are seems to be uncertain to
us. Writers on the subject differ, and, except Villoteau, no one has
investigated the subject much by studying the Arab music from and
with Arabs. It is a difficult task.
To my ear. Gypsy and Arab .music always seemed harmonious ,
sweet, melodwus, and not at all d1scordan t, and founded on the same
diatonic scale, so to speak, as our own. I say diatonic scale for lack
of a better word. They use our notes, C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, exactly, with smaller intervals between them than our sharps and flats.
They would not compose a melody in the diatonic scale, but would
always use some of these notes as the basis and then other accidental notes to form a mode upon and in which the melody is composed.
There are about thirty-six of such modes, all differing from one another.
The intervals between two succeeding notes in a mode are often
different from ours and more like the Gypsy intervals. For example,
C to D# and D# to F#.
Wri~e.rs differ as to what the Arab scale actually is. The best
~uthont~es, I:and and :-vallaschek (" A nfange der Tonkunst "), say it
IS our d1atomc scale w1th smaller intervals (quarter tones) between
the notes. Wallaschek claims that the notes of the buo-le
C, E '
0
'
G, c, the Harmonic Triad (Dreiklang), is the basis of all music,
European, Oriental, and barbaric, as fo unded on nature, on the natural laws of nature's harmonics. As stated above, this was the conclusion I came to from simply hearing Arab music, before I had
studied writers on the subject. The first books I read intimated a
contrary opinion, and I supposed my ear must be at fault. Since I
have made many tests and experiments with Arabs on the lutes
( !)~) and with voices. Some were educated in European music.
Most of them knew nothing whatever about our music, and nothing
about the theory of Arab music. Arabs perform entirely by ear and
have no system of notation to write down their music. Although
many played and sang beautifully, they knew no more about notes
or what they did or why they did it than a child when he sings.
All thus far have insisted to me that their notes are exactly the
same as ours, with small intervals between them ; that they simply
use different intervals and modes. This, of course, is my conclusion
from what they say, and many tests of lute and violin, and a few
times with a piano. They do not, however, employ our tempered
scale, but all the notes true.
I have been much puzzled on the subject, and do not feel sure I
am right in my view. It is a very difficult problem, and requires
much time, study, ~nd patience, and favorable opportunities.
One thing I am satisfied about. The Hungarian and Spanish
Gypsy music have the same peculiar characteristics, whatever they
:Journal of Amer£can Folk-Lore.
Gypsy and Or£ental Mus£c.
in their arts, poetry, and music. Their tastes are refined and elegant, as we see in their architecture, literature, and poetry. The
beautiful Oriental rugs show bold, beautiful, fascinating designs and
combinations of color, unapproachable by Occidentals. They are as
varied, complex, elaborate, brilliant, gorgeous, startling in their effects
as Oriental music. So with their architecture. Yet all is harmony
and beauty. It is hard to believe that their music can be an exception to their other arts. I do not think it is. The musician, the
scientist, must not judge Oriental music from the nasal, throaty
twanging of a laborer or poor singer. Many of the Syrians have poor
voices. They sing in the throat and through the nose. What would
an Arab decide our music and scale to be from the wheezy song of a
hod-carrier, or even the phonographic melody of a commonplace
singer?
Some of our own prima donnas even do not always sing true, especially in their trills and embellishm ents, when the orchestra does not
follow them. They use a three eighths or quarter tone instead of a
half tone. Whether they do this intuitively for an effect which pleases
their ear, as it does thr Oriental ear, may be a question. Our best violinists make a difference between F~ and G". The old spinet played
sharps and flats differently. It is our tempered scale for keyed
instruments which has made these alike in classical music.
For many years I have been studying the Gypsies, their language,
habits, trades, occupations, origin, devoting much of my time to
Oriental Gypsies, about whom very little is known or found in books.
The conclusions given above have been formed upon my own investigations, and not from what I have read. Since forming them I have
somewhat carefully studied what Liszt, Colocci, Engel, Dr. Parry,
Naumann, Rowbotham, Wallasch ek, and others have written, and I
see no reason to change my views.
Liszt ("Des Bohemiens ") has impressed me more than all. I can
see he knew Gypsies and Gypsy music. Familiar with them in his
boyhood, he almost lived with them for two years when he had become one of the greatest pianists the world has ever seen. In Hungary repeatedly (once for five months) I practically lived with them,
ate with them, associated with them intimately, and talked everything over with them in the (Rominf chib) Romany tongue. They
r eceived and treated me as a Romany brother from America. Liszt
studied, understood, and described Gypsy music as no one but a
great musician can. His views to me are convincing. They bring
back to me so vividly and clearly the little details of their music,
which I never could fully understand and dissect or explain in my
own mind. There were many "somethings " indefinable, puzzling.
Some of these Liszt has explained.
It is often stated that all old folk-songs were originally dance
tunes. Certainly such songs and music and the dance have always
been closely associated. Many Spanish dances, as the Bolero, Fandango, Sequidilla, Malaguefia, always seemed to me to be of Oriental
origin. Saraband, the name of one Spanish dance, is a Persian word.
Every rug connoisseur knows the beautiful Saraband Persian rug
with the pear-shaped figures, its border, and fine predominating
reddish color.
The Hungarian Csardas is similar to one of the Gypsy dances
there. It lias a peculiar step (knocking the heels together) which is
found in some Oriental dances. "Nobody can play or dance the
Csardas like the Gypsies themselves." So good an authority as
Liszt ventures this statement.
All the Gypsy dances of Europe strongly resemble Oriental dances.
The question in all these cases is, Did the Gypsies bring these
dances with them, or find them there and adopt them ? The same
question arises as to Persia, Syria, and Egypt.
The Badminton volume on Dancing (p. 213) states: "The Oriental style of dancing, which was practised from the earliest times in the
East, and even in Europe by a class of women who, if not absolutely
proved to be Gypsies, had, at any rate, many points of resemblance
to them. Thus the 'Syrian girl who haunts the taverns round,'
described by Virgil (?) suggests the Syrian and Egyptian dancer,
who is of Indo-Persian, that is to say, of Luri, or Gypsy origin.
Spanish girls of old times were conj ectured to have come from the
universal Hindoo-Romany stock."
The Badminton volume quotes Walter Thornbury ("Life in
Spain") : "Seville is the headquarters of the Gypsy musician and
dancer. Make way for the Gypsy girl who is going to show us how
the Egyptian ghawassees and the Hindoo nautch girls dance. She
will dance the Romalis, which is the dance Tiberius may have seen,
and which no one but a Gypsy dances in Spain. She will dance it
to the old Oriental music, and handclapping, to a - - tune-- full of
sudden pauses, which are strange and startling." Also from various
authors concerning Gypsies who danced at the head of processions
wearing little bells, in honor of Orleans princes in Spain, and also
Louis XIV and Philip V. An old Niederlandisch saga speaks of
"a troupe of Gypsies who danced very high on a tight rope. They
gave powders to a boy, and he then danced over the tops of trees and
on the weathercock of the church tower." "English Gypsies wore
bells in the sixteenth century," and "were pleasant dancers ; " so
also early in Scotland. "The English Morris dance is said to be
inspired by Gypsies." "The Syrian dancers at the beginning of the
Christian era are well represented by Salome." " Under A ugnstus
24
:Journal of A merz"can Folk-Lore.
Gypsy and Oriental Musz"c.
dancers were very popular. Three thousandforezgn women dancers
were kept in Rome. When public expenses were cut learned men
were dismissed, but the three thousand dancers were retained." Were
these Syrian girls ? " Later the character of the dancers became so
low as to be condemned by Cato and Cicero." "The old English
minstrels, gleemen, sung, danced, joked, and tumbled like the Norman jongleurs. They tossed balls and knives." Chaucer speaks of
"the dancing-girls, minstrels, jongleurs, tumblers." Martial, Juvenal,
and other authors describe the dances of the Cadiz dancing-girls
just as they are in Spain and E gypt to-day. So Pliny describes them
in Rome, the Gades dance. In medireval England, "besides music
and dancing, the minstrels, or gleemen, performed tricks and jokes;"
"the dancing of the gleemen consisted largely of vaulting and tumbling ; " "another trick was keeping knives and balls in the air ; "
"Morris dance means a Moorish dance."
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, indeed before and after,
during the Middle Ages, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and England saw large nm11bers of wandering mountebanks, jugglers, and
other showmen, story-tellers, players, all accompanying their performances with musical instruments, singing, and dancing. In Germany this class were considered vagrants and tramps.
In Italy were many of these travelling showmen, who traversed
the country exhibiting camels, monkeys, and dancing bears, jugglers,
tight-rope walkers, etc. To-day bands of Oriental Gypsies frequent
the fairs and country districts of southern Italy. They play, dance,
sing, perform acrobatic feats, are rope-dancers, toss balls and knives,
walk on stilts, and do other jugglers' tricks ; give Punch and Judy
shows, and have with them performing bears, monkeys, and other
animals. They also tattoo, and sell various small articles. The
peasantry of this district are most familiar with them, and have
often described the Zingari to me even down to the minute details.
So many have told me some of their dances are just like the tarantella, and "they make their feet go so fast you can hardly see them."
Some of these Gypsies I have seen in Italy myself. But in such
matters inquiry from a very large number of natives in different
districts gives the most important information. They see them for
years and know all about them and their shows, and they are mostly
seen in the out-of-the-way places. The police always keep them
moving. It is difficult for a stranger to find them. Their women
and children are always with them, and they camp out on the outskirts of the town.
These same Arab Gypsies are also occasionally seen in Switzerland, the Tyrol, and France, at fairs in the country. In former times
they were much more frequent visitors than to-day. The authorities
now are very strict in regulating their presence and conduct. They
are also often seen in Greece, Turkey, and parts of Austria, and
sometimes in Switzerland.
Naumann ("History of Music," p. 226) says of these showmen of
the Middle Ages: "In France, especially Provence and Normandy,
they were Jongleurs and Menestriers, men who were indifferently
buffoons, rope-dancers, or musicians, and also reciters of fables and
stories, who accompanied their recit als with music. In England
called Minstrels."
Most English readers are accustomed to think of Gypsies simply
as fortune-tellers, horse traders, horse doctors, tinkers, metal workers,
and makers and sellers of baskets, child stealers, rogues, and cheats.
Scholars have devoted themselves principally to their language as
the most similar to the Old Sanskrit of any living tongue. My own
view has been that to solve the Gypsy enigma we must study other
occupations. Very little has been known about Oriental Gypsies,
and we have not had the material n ecessary to pursue this study.
Much of what I have already written is known to but very few, and
some of it is entirely new to scholars.
One other occupation already ment ioned may bring much light on
the subject. It is that of showmen, and can be treated well in connection with their music, since these are nearly always accompanied
by musicians.
History tells us that there were many Gypsy musicians, singers,
and dancers in Persia in the fifth century, and they have been there
ever since. They were and are called Liili or Luri.
In southeast Europe there are historical references to Gypsies
certainly as early as the tenth century. The first notice on record
about Gypsies in western Europe is early in the fifteenth century,
when they rapidly spread over the country in large bands, gayly
attired, under their counts and dukes . .
Whether there were any Gypsies there before and for how long
are interesting questions. They have always had the habit of roaming over extensive distances. I have met many Gypsy bands who
travelled over a great part of Europe, others who have wandered over
the whole Caucasus, and been in E gypt, Persia, and Syria. Some
even had travelled across Siberia to the Pacific. In the United States
many Gypsies have been in nearly every State of the Union. It
was always so with them. Naturally they would have roved over
Europe long before books speak of them unless there was some
reason sufficient to prevent it. I know of no such reason. How old
the Gypsy race is nobody knows. Their language I cannot discuss
here. I speak it; have devoted much time to its study and that of
several Oriental languages to which it is akin. The Gypsy tongue
:Journal of A mer£can Folk-Lore.
does not preclude a much older origin than is generally supposed. I
express no opinion now on the origin or antiquity of this mysterious
people, but simply present some facts and considerations which may
throw some light on these points.
They are outcasts and a despised race. Writers did not condescend to speak of them. This is true of many other subjects. The
fact, therefore, that Gypsies were not mentioned in books proves
but little. When, however, they came suddenly into western Europe
as an apparition they were described. Here in the United States
are large numbers of Gypsies from southeast Europe. Most people
never hear of them. Once or twice, however, a large band has
appeared in Boston, noticeable from their numbers, dress, appearance, ,and the newspapers contain columns about them. They make
a sensation in some way, and are mentioned.
English Gypsies have been here for two centuries certainly, and
yet very little is known about them except by those interested in the
subject.
A description of Gypsy musicians and showmen who it is known
have been travelling about in western Europe fo: several centuries
would admirably portray a similar class there in mediceval ages.
This class consisted of itinerant mountebanks, jugglers, strolling
players, story-tellers, singers, dancers, jongleurs, and showmen. Some
of them were accompanied by th eir women and children. There
were crowds of them. Were any of them Gypsies?
Perhaps it would be well to quote what a good authority states
about them who does not suggest the word Gypsies in connection
with the subject.
Naumann ("History of Music," under Folk-Songs, p. 227) states:
" Specimens of the oldest secular mediceval folk-music, whether
romances of the South or popular ditties of the North Germans, are
found in the song s of mountebanks, adventurers, itinerant and strolling players, all accompanied with various instruments." -'In Germany these wandering musicians were generally tramps and vagrants,
a very characteristic class of the Middle Ages." This is just what
Gypsies were, and are often called everywhere, and what they were
supposed to be and nothing else, until Grellman discovered they had
a real language of their own.
Again (p. 228) : "In Italy they were chiefly recruited from strolling players and showmen who traversed the country exhibiting
camels, monkeys, and dancing bears, from tricksters and venders of
ceretari (sweetmeats). In France, especially Provence and Normandy, they were jongleurs and menestriers, men who were indifferently buffoons, rope-dancers, or musicians, and also reciters of
fables and story-tellers, who accompanied their recitals with music."
Gypsy and Or£ental MusZ:c.
Oriental Gypsy showmen to-day are buffoons, "funny men," storytellers, and recite poems and fables to the accompani~ent of the
reb~b, a one-stringed fiddle. The Kurds call Gypsies A 1shuk, from
Turkish 'Ash~k (~j..~;;;,l~); a story-teller.
Further from Naumann (p. 228): "Freytag supposed they were
the descendants of old gladiators and comedians who on the fall of
Rome were compelled to seek their bread among the barbarians,"
and played and piped "what had been introduced into Rome from
Asia." Undoubtedly there was just such a class of showmen and
musicians in the Roman Empire, and very probably they were later
scattered over Europe. Rome received from the East before and
after the Christian era large numbers of Oriental musicians, singers,
dancers, jugglers, tumblers, knife and ball tossers, tight-rope performers, and other showmen. Whether they lost their Oriental
character, or formed a class by themselves which persisted, is another
question. Very probably they scattered over Europe.
Naumann (p. 228) observes: "Notwithstanding the great favor with
which these wanderers were regarded by the people and their endeavors to establish the fact that their art was inherited, yet they
never achieved any social distinction or obtained any civil rights.
True it is that their existence was tolerated, but all real protection
of the law was withdrawn from them. Indeed, to such an extent
was this carried that a strolling player might suffer bodily injury,
even by the sword of his assailant, and yet have no claim .fo.r redress." And (p. 229) : "Thus this remarkable people unw1ttmgly
possessed of a romantic spirit remained throughout the Middle Ages
honorless and homeless outcasts."
Were any of them Gypsies? Th ey are outcasts. everywhere. ~t
this very period we know there were t housands of JUSt such Gyps1es
in the East. Had any of them then arrived in the West?
Naumann says (p. 229): "When the players moved about in companies, women and children formed part of the t:oupe, the former
taking part in the performances as dancers and smgers. Amongst
those companies that roved through the South we find women and
children skilfully using the well-known Orient~l tambo~rine. and
Egyptian clappers in their wanton dances. The1r wandenng, diss?lute life induced a certain moral laxity that brought upon them pubbc
censure, so that Childebert promulgated very stringent laws for the
suppression of their licentiousness."
This was about 500 A. n. I have never heard or read of any such
class of showmen who wander with their families except the lowest
class of Oriental Gypsies. Irish tinkers are not Gypsies. They
roam about with their families. They are not showmen. Some
Slovaks travel in wagons with a familv to sell wares they make.
:Journal of American Folk-Lore.
Gypsy and Oriental Music.
Otherwise no race wanders about in Europe with families except
Gypsies. So it has always been, I think, excepting Tartar and Arab
nomads, an entirely different class, so far as is known. To cite from
Naumann again (p. 229): "They were found in hundreds at court
festivals and fairs, on great market days, and when celebrated pilgrimages were to be made, rewards in money, food, or raiment were
usually very great. They were also the secret messengers of nobles
and kings, courier d'amour of lovers." The Gypsies everywhere
have been always used as spies, messengers, and "go-betweens,"
not only in the East but in E urope. Tartar, Turkish, Hungarian,
and other armies have frequently used them as spies and messengers. They are the Shah's couriers in Persia to-day. Gypsy women
in Egypt and everywhere are noted as arranging meetings for lovers.
"During the eleventh and twelfth centuries mountebanks and
strolling minstrels were engaged by the Troubadours and Minnesingers. At first only as accompanists to poetizing nobles and
knights; later they spread the songs of their masters." Our word
juggler is like jongleur, from th e Latin jocularius, ludicrous, "funny,"
joculator, a "funny man," man who makes fun. This is one of the
specialties of the Gypsy showmen. And page 237: "In Spain they
were called joglares, and Estevan de Terreros speaks also of female
jongleurs, joglareses, who roamed about the country with the joglares, as lute and mandolin players." The Italian "trovatore"
means troubadour. The opera "Il Trovatore" assumes they were
Gypsies. Very many operas are Gypsy operas. There seems to be
a widespread tradition that troubadours and jongleurs and minstrels
were Gypsies. Many of the most celebrated Welsh harpers have
been Gypsies.
The name troubadour· properly should be applied to the courtly
noblemen and gentlemen who composed verses and sang them before
their lady loves to their own accompaniment. Generally they hired
stro1ling musicians, jongleurs, minstrels, to sing and play their compositions. Often, however, the term troubadour was also applied to
the jongleurs. The Minnesingers ordinarily had no bards like the
troubadours.
In the seventh century it is known from history that there were
many thousands of Gypsy musicians in Persia. They were the public
musicians, then, of that country. They are nomads. Would they
not naturally have followed in the wake of Arab armies into Spain ?
At that time all armies had a large number of camp followers,
including many women. There is nothing to prove this. It is all
a matter of inference from certain facts. It always seemed to me
surprising that the bands of Gypsies entering Spain from the north
in the fifteenth century could so soon increase to fifty thousand as
they are to-day and have been for some centuries, in spite of cruel
persecutions. The Spanish Gypsy dialect shows many words which
must have come from southeast Europe, and many other things show
their language must have come that way. Still it is by no means
impossible that very many Oriental Gypsies have come into Spain
by the north coast of Africa. They are all along there now. Much
Spanish music and many dances are plainly Oriental, whoever
brought them, Moors or Gypsies or both. One thing must be remembered in all Moslem and Eastern countries, from the seclusion of their women there is and was always a Gypsy-like class of
musicians, singers, and dancers, and showmen.
In France, Germany, and Italy the Gypsies were never numerous,
and to-day those who belong there are few in numbers. Still in
France at country fairs they are sometimes still seen as jugglers,
tumblers, acrobats, and showmen. Italy I have already spoken of as
to visiting Arab showmen. The extreme repressive measures and
strict police rules have greatly affected their numbers in Germany.
Still in many places there are colonies of settled Gypsies who roam
about as musicians and showmen.
Enough has been stated to show that during the Middle Ages
everywhere in Europe was a roving class of musicians and showmen
who had with them their families, and long before the fifteenth century. The only class who answers the same description to-day and
for several centuries are Gypsies. It is impossible to go into the
whole matter fully now, and I refrain therefore from expressing any
opinion of my own.
Many have thought the Gypsies have had much to do with spreading folk-songs over Europe, as Groome, Leland, and others. Elizabeth Robbins Pennell thinks the Gyspies introduced the bagpipe into
Europe. In many countries it is a characteristic Gypsy instrument
to-day. There are several other musical instruments so peculiar to
the Gypsies, not only in Europe but in the East, the subj ect is most
interesting, but space forbids more t han the mere suggestion here.
It is important also, and directly ears on the question of their
influence on music and the dance.
The whole matter can be summed up briefly thus : All the public
musicians, singers, and dancers to-day of the western Orient are
Gypsies. There has been a similar caste there since long before
Christ. Were they Gypsies? When did they disappear and the
Gypsies monopolize their place? Customs, habits, peoples, change
very slowly in the East. The tunic of a farm laborer in India is the
same to-day as two thousand years ago, as depicted on sculptured
stone. So in Persia, Syria, and Egypt the plows, the farmers'
tools, the shepherds, their manner bf caring for their sheep and
goats, are the same as in old Bible times.
30
3I
32
:Journal of A mert'can Folk-Lore.
Many questions about ancient matters can be settled only by
studying the East to-day. Professor A. V. Williams Jackson, in his
recent book on Persia (p. 75), speaks of how a Zoroastrian simile was
settled which had always puzzled him. A Pahlavi book says," On the
last day, "a wicked man shall be as conspicuous in that assembly as
a white sheep among the black." He found in the Urumiah district
a white sheep is rare. So it is among the Kurds, all the sheep are
black with rare exceptions until we reach the southern district,
Diarbekir.
In this article I. have attempted simply to state in a general way
some facts which may throw some light on the vexed questions of
the antiquity and origin of this mysterious people, questions which
never have been satisfactorily answered.
One thing has always impressed me. Those who have lived in
the Orient, both natives and Europeans, have so often suggested to
me an older and different origin from what has been commonly supposed. Such people know Orientals, their history, customs, habits,
and . characteristics. They realize many details unknown to Europeans, just as Professor Jackson explained the puzzling Pahlavi text
only from being in Persia. Such opinions should be carefully considered before rejecting them. I refer to the many kind friends all
over the East who have carefully considered the subject and assisted
me in my investigations.
A. T. Sinclair.
ALLSTON, MASS.
10
New Wash Goods
Opening of the
Spring and Summer Styles
A
LITTLE
GRIST
"NIG ~T
ri
----,
Women Ran Some of Tl
North End with Succe
Many Men Have in
S t raight Lives-A Tem
Why Men Do Not Bath
1909
New Wool Goods
Week of March 1st
Every department is prepared to make the coming season
the largest in our history. To this end we have gathered
the most attractive assortments of high-grade merchandise that it has ever been our privilege to show.
.Byron E. Bailey
Company
31-33 WINTER STREET
MUSIC OF THE INDIANS
FINAL RESULTS OF T HE HEMENWAY
EXPEDI'I'ION
Careful Study of the Hopi Indian Music
by Benjamin Ives Gilman Convinces Him
That the Indian Music Is oE a Type
Hitherto Unknown in Its Independence
of a Scale-Another Fvidence of the
Indigenous Origin of Aborigin al American
Civilization
Hopi Songs.
By B .njam!n lvE'!' Gilman,
secretary of the Mu ·eum or Fine Arts, Boston.
Journal of ·American Ethnology and Archreolo-
~-e [J~!;~sldaen~r;~~-cll9~1 ~g Pv;_l~ve;. 23~~~~r~
notations and d!avrams.
The first Europeans to land on American soil thought they had reached the
Eurasian continent again, and named th~
country the West Indies. Later i.t was found
o be a new world. Likewise the earll .. r
students of aboriginal American mu~lc
thought it based on the Eurasian scale
and Its harmonies; and to complete the
parallel the latest investigator of Indian
Finging believes it on the contrary a new
world of musical form, melodic instead
of harmonic in basis and constructE'd
without the use of a scale. This claim
;,;iG.J~R g-rcnmls are · set forth in a volume
entitled "Hopi s;ns:s" jus(-i:.S"ti'sd- by ttl(;
Riverside Press.*
The scif.Jnce of comparative music ID!lY
be said to be the offspring of the phonograph. Until actual music could be fixed
for reproduction at will our knowledge
...-~~----"""' 'ol_"'-.t
el
• the art outside of
one nr Twn nn lv :~q tn F.urnn~·an music.
The device seems therefore an amplification of th~ . dls~inctlon between ~Y and
grave fam1l1ar 1n our own ears, and suggests indefinite possibilities of emotional
expressiveness in music. All travellers bea r
witness to t.b~ moving power of Indian
son"", and even in these bare scores the
author finds evidence of it. But. as a botanist In his laboratory cannot predict the
habits of a plant, so a music!an in his
study cannot dogmatlz~ upon the place that
these songs fill in the lives of the singers.
H is inferences as to their expressive content must, as the author says, be largely
conjectural. The test of experience in the
field Is essential.
It is to be ho.oed that future investigators may combine this field experience with
similar exact laboratory study. In his introductory essay the author makes the suggestion that this plastic melody of the
Pueblos may be the ethnic musical type of
the Americas. The rockbound fastnesses
of the
m rican dese rt may in these notations have y ielded the secret nf the elaborate art which so impressed the Spanish
discoverers of America. The suggestion offers one of those opportunities ior proof or
disproof by which science mainly advances.
If in the Pueblos this ancient music doubt1 ss lingers elsewhere also-on our own
plain!', in the swamps of the .'\mazon, the
defiles of !\texico. or the short:s and barrens of British Columbia. ·It remains to
apply the same microscopic analysis to the
rsp.in y van! hing song of the?.e faraway
reg1ons. Science will he the gainer whether
the a •Jtochtbonous theory be confirmed or
gainsaid.
The ,·olume doses .with a review of th~>
work of the Hemenway Southwestern Expedition by Mr. Gilman and. Mi~. Katherine
Some of the •heap lod
North End, a few years a
:women A !though they wet
And it is worthy of note, th
who turn to this Kind of D
arre generally Spe.a.king of 1
It would Seem that thi!'l
cans for Extra capacity.
A WOMAN'S FAITH '
A few years ago, A we
couple of these, and as a
men to get Lodgers h
eoffee !\Iornings And very
Stew was given free, to th
a bed, yes a.nd often Son
and-outs who had Ever lod
3JlY of them who had .r.::\
decent would be given a b
not have the Price, And
to Say tha.t while Some
,to return the kindness Tl:
did come back to Pay as
remember one case 111
Mention. A certain man
a consld~rable time, But
b d regular E\·e-ry ulg
on "Whalllng Vessel, and
months. one day a man ren
'S~range that So and So nev
<:onsid~lng the way he wa~
the Landlady observed, tt Is
that he has not S"tHYwn up, he
s-omewhere, 'he will come ba
And ~he was right in a r ?W ..
right ln and Paid up all. N
cbse of reading Character
take. '\Ve like to have "
to record of this cla.es B
cumslances are always a
the temptations of Povert
all the Poor are not uep
is a fact ,u1at Poverty 1
pravlt~.
One thing that makes
ple In the Common Lod
associates. none of the
choose, they must mix
the Bad and the good Al
us of a case where Twent
!ng In one Room, one a
loud Snorer, and kept all
all night. of course thl
man on the move, He I
than one night any •·
fault of his. It is a dl£:t
They Say that Thievery
If So the ·world is a
And there is no Doctor
scribe for the disease.
There are thousands
kinds of Nostrums.
spreadirft all the time
the remedies are orr
He turns his head
thank you, not for
disease.
A
BATH ORDIN A....._O:
ENF'C' 0
Gl
0
Most People knO\'u1 ~<j. ~ · <1'hcalth have Rules l., · ~~ "1_... G
tl'ese lodging house
~~'~ 'i? ·~
P ople who run the/
~ ~
up to these rule • !
~
f' . . ·
t-
.. _
,.. ...
'l"h
udy ot .Amenca.n
eology s ...
noteworthy !~c:e of the
htened pubue spirit tor JWh~ the cttlsensbtp Off Boston bas been dlatln«ulf!ed. The ftelc! work
of the expedition began In 1
and conttnued \Dltll rs. Heme
y's death In 1894.
The j
ooUected bKsmde beside the pre._
.riQh
t
·~tono ur.
ubbl&ton
tth
il
A. ; the e.rob--...-~
_,.va• ts, D r. H . F . C . --t
_. a
an4 Dr. Adolph F. Bandelier; the late .John
G. Owens, afterward chief executive oftloer
of the Pe&Alody ~dltlon to Honduras, and
Mr. A. M. Stephen, long a resident among
t:h~ Hopi. Professor Edward . Morse and
Mr. Sylvester Baxter represented the eY·
pedltlon at the Berlln Congresa of Amerl·
canlsts In 1
and 1892
rs. Hemenway
sent a collection of specimens from the
Pueblos in Dr. Fewkes' care 'to the Madrid
E:J!POsltlon, commemorating the di8COvery ot
America. The review closes with an lm·
posing llst ot titles of the boola!, mono·
gra,pha and essays whleh have been tbe merary Jrult of the ped'ltlon. Taken In su!ll
tlhese results constitute an achievement of
lncalrulable value to America. Dlsa.ppearing xestlges or an Important brant"h of Ita
a.borlglnal inhabitants have been made forever a possession of the nation by the lntelligent enthUijdaam of one ardent lover· of
her country.
r-----:-'li!iil~oii'iiei""""l'li"R.l~r:ntlllle-a''"Ul~rT!-ft'llr........... ~-----. ..""'"tbe 8
rtsts inferences from ln trumental forms
and itot tiona In baste by observers g erally untrained. Seventeen years ago
spusleal performance wa.s ftrst closely ob•
erved and accurately tra11scribed by a
t
ent at l~tav.re as a botanist might
c utlnlze and d w t e s u
.. -a
.. ..
..
~
\
honograibie records of Hopi or Mout singing obtained by Dr. Fewkes at
e Pueblos of northeastern Arizona.
In C'Omments appended to the Zuni no(atlone, Mr. Gilman maintained that tbls
$uelc was of a type hitherto unknown In
ita Independence of a scale. Thi-s view
as. In the present volume, been sub·
ltted to the test of fresh evidence; ancl
the opinion of its author Is strongly
nflrmed thereby. Pueblo melodies prent. the unique case of a non·scalar mu.
c. If true, this conclusion forges antber link in the chain ~f evidence tor
e indigenous origin of aboriginal
merlcan clviltzatlon.
n Important section of the present
olume Is devoted to an Inquiry Into the
ustwortblness of the l»honographlc
ethod ·o f studying musrcal performance.
series of physical tests of the instru·
ent proved it of ampli! precision for 1:he
rposes of such Investigations, Its aber·
aUon being In general o small as to be
eyond discovery by the finest ears. That
hf! music In crlbed was th normal sin&'·
of the performers, unlntluenced by
rnbarrassment or other source of dis·
ortion, was Indicated by the general
estimony of those who had used the
trument and confirmed by the Internal
ructure ot the records. Fortified by
ese concluslohs, the author undertook
determination of tht course 'Of tone
o owed by the Hopi alngers, which bea e eventually
ven times as minute
that
resJed n the customary noatlon of music. '1'hB lt'ne of. he a
o
mst
of
:tea
he cornm n
ic l s all, ones thr~ o1"
\lr l£,eya a
n our pianos, ex re
09
h equt ent to half
between D
'¥ and the ne t
t
s,
q,uarte
and this -small dlfe~nce is stlll further divided by notes
n cUtrerent poet Ions between the lines.
be notations may therefore be dertbed as microscopic drawings of muelcal performance, the power employed
elng seven diameters.
An unlooked-for and remarkable dis·
covery was the result of this minute
study. Hopi ~ongs are not melodies in
our sense of the word. They consist of
dUferent renderings of melody, qo one
t>f watch can be called the song. Inetead, the song app r In general either
a progressive change of rendering, or a
regularly rhythmic sequence o' alternative renderings. The work of art ls
not a 11ingle motive-as a song is elsew}Wlre in the world-it Is not even a
motive with variations, but a progressive or recurrent alteration of a repeated
m tve, no one repetition the standard
and no one a variant. This music has
the mobllity and poise of llving U sue-!
Such Protean form cannot, In the autllor's
Inion 1:>e. b e on th Procru t an
outltn s of a deftnlte scale or precise harmon!es. Tbe Hopi sonp are. In his beUef,
eate tral s of ton . followed as trans are
Uh a general fidelity to the p~th and the
goat, but with a free choice of lndlv:dual
eps. The word "scale" meanA originallY
talrway, a.nd the author COIQpa!"es the constraint of European music to stepping back
and fo th on a fixed series of treads: while
for Hopi music he choo es the old word
"rote-song," comparing its liberty to pas·
sap over a famUlar mountain route, often
by t
Identical ledge , but often by new
tootbOlds also.
e most conspicuous form of variation
lf! a mall displacement of the plteh of cer·
talJl notes like that which in llluropean
'Jilusic would ch nge a major Into a minor
melody. But In Hopi singing the change
may affect any number of notes and not
~=================~
BRILLIANTS
Nothing is so strong as gentleneu,
Nothing so gentle as strength.
[St. Francis de Sales.
That man may last, but never llves,
Who much receives but nothing gives;
Whom none can love, whom none can
thank,
Creation's blot,
Yes, leave It with Him, the lllles all "do;
And they grow.
They grow In the rain, and they crow In
the dew,
Yes, they grow.
They grow In the darkness all .bid In the
night,
'rhey grow in the sunshine revealed by the
light:
Still they grow.
[Anon.
CB
J'oumal]
Everything has to be sclenttftc nowadays:
cooking, beverages, education, sport. . .
Book-keeping, law, hy.,.ene, soclolonthat Is what we teach our children. No
wonder the world Is so dull. To enjoy one'sself 1 not scientific.
[From the Parle
. lnlster of C u lnl<.'haeJ, in 'F ,f ,
cotland, frequently talked from the pulpit
to hi8 bearers with amu I • anti, tndeecl,
trrever nt famlllarlty .. E po ding a passage from Exqdu one , day he proceeded
thus: "'And the Lord said unto Moaes'!"neck that door! I'm thinking If ye had to
sit be Ide thf! door yersel', ye wadna be
sae ready leaving It open. It wae ]ust be·
side that door that Yedam Tamson, the
bellman. got his death o' cauld, and I 'm
sure, hone t man, he dldna let it stay
muckle open. 'And the Lord said unto
oses'-I see a man aneath the Jaft wl'
his hat on. I 'm suNt. man, we 're clear o'
the soogb o• that door there. Keep atf
your bannet, Thlimas. and If your bare
pow could be c:l.uld, ye maun just get a
gray worsted wig, like myset'. They're no
sae dear-plenty o' them a.t Bob Gillespie's
for tenpence apiece." The reveren~ gentleman then proceeded wltb bla 41scouree.
n
r. .
ort
ao
1
to ,
r
song
nd
t hat you
t
o
rep i nt of your
d my
tr ve
an
ou : or
xc
- rw' k
you~:
>t h.
n
paper
onder
ot i n -
m
y
h
t
can ac-
c n-
lmos
b
oourtc y .:.n
•rolk-
on th
c
s ch
I d o no t
quire 6Uc h k n o 1 d g
t h~n
ul t
t hirte nth ,
rt'cl
nd me but incre
form t - n .
tan
r c ipt
ue i c of C talun •.
yo1 c n ace
ho
th
ckno l d
ki d let er ot J nu r
our v r
nolo sin
St. ,
inelair:
r.
I o g
of
16, 191L
• Sinclnir ,
7
y d
r
I
oud.:.ug
roprin · of you
t o b li v
m ,
i th
1ucol o • -ards
ishe ,
Very t ruly yours ,
nd good