Editing Romani people (section)

== Persecutions ==

=== Roma enslavement ===

{{See also|Slavery in Romania}}

[[File:Ștefan cel Mare. Danie sălașe de țigani pentru Episcopia Rădăuți.jpg|thumb|300x300px|A deed of donation through which [[Stephen III of Moldavia]] donates a number of ''sălașe'' of Romani slaves to the Rădăuţi bishopric]]

One of the most enduring persecutions against the Roma was their enslavement. [[Slavery in medieval Europe|Slavery was widely practiced in medieval Europe]], including the territory of present-day [[Romania]] from before the founding of the principalities of [[Moldavia]] and [[Wallachia]] in the 13th–14th centuries.{{sfn|Achim|2004|p=27}} Legislation decreed that all the Roma living in these states, as well as any others who immigrated there, were classified as slaves.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Istoria și tradițiile minorității rromani |page=36 |year=2005 |publisher=Sigma |location=Bucharest |author1-link=Delia Grigore |last1=Grigore |first1=Delia |first2=Petre |last2=Petcuț |first3=Mariana |last3=Sandu |language=ro}}</ref> Slavery was gradually [[Abolitionism|abolished]] during the 1840s and 1850s.{{sfn|Achim|2004|p=27}}

The exact origins of [[Slavery in Romania|slavery]] in the [[Danubian Principalities]] are not known. There is some debate over whether the Roma came to Wallachia and Moldavia as free people or were brought there as slaves. Historian [[Nicolae Iorga]] associated the Roma's arrival with the 1241 [[Mongol invasion of Europe]] and he also considered their enslavement a vestige of that era, in which the [[Romanians]] took the Roma from the [[Mongols]] and preserved their status as slaves so they could use their labor. Other historians believe that the Roma were enslaved while they were being captured during the battles with the Tatars. The practice of enslaving [[prisoners of war]] may have also been adopted from the Mongols.{{sfn|Achim|2004|p=27}}

[[File:Bilet de dezrobire 1848.jpg|thumb|300x300px|Slave liberation certificate issued during the [[Wallachian Revolution of 1848]]]]

Some Roma may have been slaves of the Mongols or the Tatars, or they may have served as auxiliary troops in the Mongol or Tatar armies. However, most of them migrated from south of the [[Danube]] at the end of the 14th century, some time after the [[founding of Wallachia]]. By then, the institution of slavery was already established in Moldavia and it was possibly established in both principalities. After the Roma migrated into the area, slavery became a widespread practice among the majority of the population. The [[Tatars|Tatar]] slaves, smaller in numbers, were eventually merged into the Romani population.<ref>{{Citation |first=Ștefan |last=Ștefănescu |title=Istoria medie a României |volume=I |publisher=Editura Universității din București |place=Bucharest |year=1991 |language=ro}}</ref>

=== Historical persecution ===

{{See also|Anti-Romani sentiment}}

Some branches of the Roma reached western Europe in the 15th century, fleeing from the [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman]] conquest of the Balkans as refugees.<ref name="Western Europe"/> Although the Roma were refugees from the conflicts in southeastern Europe, they were often suspected of being associated with the [[Ottoman wars in Europe|Ottoman invasion]] by certain populations in the West because their physical appearance was exotic. (The [[Reichstag (Holy Roman Empire)#The Reichstag in the Holy Roman Empire|Imperial Diet]] at Landau and Freiburg in 1496–1498 declared that the Roma were spies for the Turks). In western Europe, such suspicions and discrimination against people who constituted a visible minority resulted in persecution, often violent, with attempts to commit [[ethnic cleansing]] until the modern era. In times of social tension, the Romani suffered as scapegoats; for instance, they were accused of bringing the plague during times of [[epidemics]].<ref name="timeline">{{cite web |url=http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5121/timeline.htm |publisher=Patrin Web Journal |title=Timeline of Romani History |access-date=26 August 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071111142247/http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5121/timeline.htm |archive-date=11 November 2007}}</ref>

On 30 July 1749, Spain conducted [[The Great Roundup of Gypsies (1749)|''The Great Roundup'']] of [[Gitanos|Roma]] (Gitanos) in its territory. The Spanish Crown ordered a nationwide raid that led to the break-up of families because all able-bodied men were interned in forced labor camps in an attempt to commit ethnic cleansing. The measure was eventually reversed and the Roma were freed as protests began to erupt in different communities, sedentary Roma were highly esteemed and protected in rural Spain.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://web.jet.es/gea21/mteorico/apuntes/anexo3.htm |title=Cap. 2: 2.1 Apuntes sobre la situación de la comunidad gitana en la sociedad Española – Anexo III. 'Gitanos malos, gitanos buenos' |trans-title=Chap. 2: 2.1 Notes on the situation of the gypsy community in Spanish society – Affix III. 'Bad gypsies, good gypsies' |language=es |publisher=The Barañí Project – Roma Women |date=29 February 2000 |access-date=27 July 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010712072449/http://web.jet.es/gea21/mteorico/apuntes/anexo3.htm |archive-date=12 July 2001}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |title=Another Darkness Another Dawn |last=Taylor |first=Becky |publisher=Reaktion Books Ltd. |year=2014 |location=London UK |pages=105 |isbn=978-1-78023-257-7}}</ref>

Later in the 19th century, Romani immigration was forbidden on a racial basis in areas outside Europe, mostly in the English-speaking world. In 1880, Argentina prohibited immigration by Roma, as did the United States in 1885.<ref name="timeline" />

[[File:Romani women in jail, Los Angeles, California, 1940.jpg|thumb|Romani women in [[Lincoln Heights Jail]], Los Angeles, California, 1940]]

=== Forced assimilation ===
[[File:Bundesarchiv R 165 Bild-244-48, Asperg, Deportation von Sinti und Roma.jpg|thumb|Deportation of Roma from [[Asperg]], Germany, 1940 (photograph by the ''Rassenhygienische Forschungsstelle'')]]
In the [[Habsburg monarchy]] under [[Maria Theresa]] (1740–1780), a series of decrees tried to integrate the Romanies to get them to [[sedentism|permanently settle]], removed their rights to horse and wagon ownership (1754) to reduce citizen-mobility, renamed them "New Citizens" and obliged Romani boys into military service just as any other citizens were if they had no trade (1761, and Revision 1770), required them to register with the local authorities (1767), and another decree prohibited marriages between Romanies (1773) to integrate them into the local population. Her successor [[Josef II]] prohibited the wearing of traditional Romani clothing along with the use of the [[Romani language]], both of which were punishable by flogging.<ref name="samer" /> During this time, the schools were obliged to register and integrate Romani children; this policy was the first of the modern policies of integration. In Spain, attempts to assimilate the Gitanos were under way as early as 1619, when the Gitanos were forcibly settled, the use of the [[Romani language]] was prohibited, Gitano men and women were sent to separate workhouses and their children were sent to orphanages. [[Charles III of Spain|King Charles III]] took a more progressive approach to Gitano assimilation, proclaiming that they had the same rights as Spanish citizens and ending the official denigration of them which was based on their [[Race (human categorization)|race]]. While he prohibited their nomadic lifestyle, their use of the [[Calo language]], the manufacture and wearing of Romani clothing, their trade in horses and other itinerant trades, he also forbade any form of discrimination against them and he also forbade the guilds from barring them. The use of the word ''gitano'' was also forbidden to further their assimilation, it was replaced with "New Castilian", a designation which was also applied to former [[History of the Jews in Spain|Jews]] and [[Islam in Spain|Muslims]].<ref>{{ cite book |first=Angus |surname=Fraser |title=Los gitanos |publisher=Ariel |year=2005 |isbn=978-84-344-6780-4}}</ref><ref>Texto de la pragmática en la [https://books.google.com/books?id=UnBFAAAAcAAJ&dq=%22Declaro+que+los+que+llaman+y+se+dicen+gitanos+no+lo+son+por+origen+ni+por+naturaleza%2C+ni+provienen+de+raiz+infecta+alguna%22&pg=PA367 ''Novísima Recopilación''. Ley XI], pg. 367 y ss.</ref>

Most historians believe that Charles III's [[Pragmatic sanction|pragmática]] failed for three main reasons, reasons which were ultimately derived from its implementation outside major cities as well as in marginal areas: The difficulty which the Gitano community faced in changing its nomadic lifestyle, the marginal lifestyle to which the community had been driven by society and the serious difficulties of applying the pragmática in the fields of education and work. One author ascribes its failure to the overall rejection of the integration of the Gitanos by the wider population.<ref name="samer">{{cite web |url=http://rombase.uni-graz.at//cgi-bin/art.cgi?src=data%2Fhist%2Fmodern%2Fmaria.en.xml |title=Maria Theresia and Joseph II: Policies of Assimilation in the Age of Enlightened Absolutism |publisher=Karl-Franzens-Universitaet Graz |website=Rombase |date=December 2001 |first=Helmut |last=Samer |access-date=3 October 2015 |archive-date=6 April 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150406004922/http://rombase.uni-graz.at//cgi-bin/art.cgi?src=data%2Fhist%2Fmodern%2Fmaria.en.xml}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.everyculture.com/Europe/Gitanos-History-and-Cultural-Relations.html |title=Gitanos. History and Cultural Relations |publisher=World Culture Encyclopedia |access-date=26 August 2007}}</ref>

Other policies of forced assimilation were implemented in other countries, one of these countries was Norway, where a law which permitted the state to remove children from their parents and place them in state institutions was passed in 1896.<ref>{{cite web |last=Kenrick |first=Donald |title=Roma in Norway |url=http://www.reocities.com/~patrin/norway.htm |publisher=Patrin Web Journal |access-date=13 March 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130429054318/http://www.reocities.com/~patrin/norway.htm |archive-date=29 April 2013}}</ref> This resulted in some 1,500 Romani children being taken from their parents in the 20th century.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.oikoumene.org/en/resources/documents/central-committee/2002/the-church-of-norway-and-the-roma-of-norway |title=The Church of Norway and the Roma of Norway |publisher=[[World Council of Churches]] |date=3 September 2002}}</ref>

=== Porajmos (Romani Holocaust) ===
{{Main|Romani Holocaust}}
During [[World War II]] and [[the Holocaust]], the persecution of the Roma reached a peak during the [[Romani Holocaust]] (the Porajmos), the [[genocide]] which was perpetrated against them by [[Nazi Germany]]. In 1935, Roma living in Germany were stripped of citizenship by the [[Nuremberg laws]] and subsequently subjected to violence and imprisonment in [[Nazi concentration camps|concentration camps]]. During the war, the policy was extended to areas under German occupation, and it was also implemented by other axis countries, most notably, by the [[Independent State of Croatia]], [[Romania in World War II|Romania]], and [[Hungary in World War II|Hungary]]. From 1942, Roma were subjected to [[genocide]] in [[extermination camp]]s.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Genocide of European Roma (Gypsies), 1939–1945 |url=https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/genocide-of-european-roma-gypsies-1939-1945 |website=Holocaust Encyclopedia}}</ref>

Because no accurate pre-war census figures exist for the Roma, the actual number of Romani victims who were killed in the Romani Holocaust cannot be assessed. Estimates range from 90,000 victims to as high as 4,000,000, with a majority falling between 200,000 and 500,000. Lower estimates do not include those Roma who were killed in all [[Axis powers|Axis]]-controlled countries. A detailed study by Sybil Milton, a former senior historian at the [[U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum]], contained an estimate of at least 220,000, possibly as many as 500,000.<ref>{{Citation |url=http://www.nyed.uscourts.gov/pub/rulings/cv/1996/685455.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040409001621/http://www.nyed.uscourts.gov/pub/rulings/cv/1996/685455.pdf |archive-date=9 April 2004 |title=Re. Holocaust Victim Assets Litigation (Swiss Banks) Special Master's Proposals |date=11 September 2000}}</ref> [[Ian Hancock]], Director of the Program of Romani Studies and the Romani Archives and Documentation Center at the [[University of Texas at Austin]], argues in favour of a higher figure of between 500,000 and 1,500,000.<ref>{{Citation |type=article |url=http://www.radoc.net/radoc.php?doc=art_e_holocaust_porrajmos&lang=en |contribution=Romanies and the Holocaust: A Reevaluation and an Overview |editor-last=Stone |editor-first=D |year=2004 |title=The Historiography of the Holocaust |publisher=Palgrave |place=Basingstoke and New York |access-date=14 February 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131113233924/http://www.radoc.net/radoc.php?doc=art_e_holocaust_porrajmos&lang=en |archive-date=13 November 2013}}</ref>