Melungeons - Parse for American Roma, Gypsy; Other European, Moor, Native American, Black,

Origins of Melungeons

An Ethnic/Racial Mix.  Which?
Components of a Blend: Difficult to Parse

A Roma heritage may sometimes be claimed by others, who examine histories of population, but not necessarily conform to the oral tradition of some of a mixed group. Is that what has happened with a possible/probable connection of a group known as Melungeons; and a Gypsy or Roma branch within that group. Even a deep root. Whether from enslaved Roma brought to the South Carolina shores, or otherwise entering, even as early as with early explorers, as sailors; or other "undocumented immigrants" collected and dropped.

• Updates:  Melungeon origins by DNA --  South of Sahara African and then White roots 5.26.2912. Melungeon origins.  A DNA study in Tennessee shows connections within narrower sets of ethnic and racial roots:  merely black, south of the Sahara in Africa, and white. See http://www.tennessean.com/article/20120526/NEWS21/305260028/Melungeons-aren-t-who-they-thought

•  Update:  Melungeon Moorish origins 4.18.2011 -- See this site, Islamic in origin, tracing Islamic peoples to the Melungeons, see Moors -- Islamic Roots of Melungeons   Earlier here, we noted "Moors" as among the possible-probable components of the melange of Melungeons, and this site adds detail to the theory. For you to vet.  

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1.  Our start. We read "The Secret Life of Bees," by Sue Monk Kidd; and saw the film, and made connections at The Fodder Site, Mixed Origins, Clues to Religions, Cultures.

We saw a thread among various cultures in different scenes from the book and film: 

a) see the iconic painting of the Black Madonna in the book and film (if you know the story, this is the picture on the honey jars), and ask how it got to a slave-descended family.

b) see the Black carved female figure in the parlor, like an intermediary, a source of inspiration to women in kinds of bondage and suffering from "slavery days;"  and ask who that might be, what blend of African roots and other cultural intersections, reinforcing the principles,

c) see the slave-descendant culture, and slave culture more broadly - how many other groups were enslaved, not just Blacks, and that would have intermingled with other slave groups, including enslaved Gypsy or Roma; and other indentured servants. When freed, who joined up with whom, where did they go.

The American South was and is a complex geneological place. We see traces of other ethnic groups particularly in the dialect of the Old South, Uncle Remus Tales, Translations: Inland Slave Heritage.  Find there traces of the Portuguese in the words used, especially "palaver" that is Portuguese; think of all the Portuguese sailors landing in the south.

2.  We came across a name for one group of mixed heritage, the Melungeons. 

Now mostly in Appalachia, there is a group with a varied background, reflected in the name itself. The Melungeons are named perhaps after the Greek "melan" for Black; or the Portuguese "melungo" for shipmate;  or the Italian "melongeno" for eggplant; the Turkish "melun can" for accursed one; old English "melangin" for guile; or the French "melange" for mixture. See "The Malungean Heritage Association" at ://www.melungeon.org/node/4/. Their first documentation stems from southwern Virginia, bordering on Tennessee; also southern Ohio, parts of Kentucky. Groups like them, or vestiges, are also along the Atlantic Seaboard.

3.  Some find a Roma or Gypsy connection with the Melungeons. 

It is like a missing link, geneologically. How to explain the origins, the broad variation in characteristics, where they came from.  This Roma connection is explored by Linda Griggs in "Patrin," a Roma Journal. The article is "The Black Dutch, German Gypsies, or Chicanere, and Their Relation to the Melungeons," by Linda Griggs.  See ://www.geocities.com/~patrin/melungeon.htm/

With a landing point at the South Carolina coast for many enslaved Roma, see "The Never-Ending Road American Roma (Gypsies), Travellers and "Others," at ://sciway3.net/clark/freemoors/, this makes sense. Start there, many end up in Appalachia.by Henry Burke at two sites --

a.  "Origins of the Appalachian-Melungeon Subculture: A More Plausible Explanation for the Origin of Melungeons." See ://www.coax.net/people/lwf/HRB_MEL.HTM/. and

b. "A Possible End to the Mystery of the Melungeons," at ://www.melungeons.com/articles/mysteryBurke.htm/ 

4.  Other accounts of origins, including some Melungeons themselves, and according to the Melungeon Heritage Society site, however, do not include Roma or Gypsy. 

They name Portuguese and Spanish sailors, Egyptian, India Indian, Native American, Turks, Moors, Jews, Blacks, other European and Middle East. Read the long list of names given to specific groups -  See also "A Brief Overview of the Melungeons" by Wayne Winkler at ://www.melungeon.org/node/4/.

"Dark-skinned, frustratingly European-looking" - and pushed off their purchased land, in an ethnic cleansing effort in Appalachia, see this Google Book, "The Melungeons, the Resurrection of a Proud People: The Untold Story of Ethnic Cleansing in America, " by Robyn Vaughan Kennedy, at ://books.google.com/books?hl=en&id=Jqhd3tVSJNkC&dq=melungeon&printsec=frontcover&source=web&ots=_G_P-73RUk&sig=pFnoL0eaXJIhbixjOvmOa8hfZKU&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=5&ct=result

But to us, outsiders, this Gypsy Roma possible connection adds to the Melungeon Heritage site, not detracts from it. See origins also at  Poland Road Ways, Black Madonna in American South.

The Roma culture is rich in talent and survival skills. Otherwise, they would be gone after a thousand years of persecution.

Do see "The Secret Life of Bees," see ://www.imdb.com/title/tt0416212/.

The book is by Sue Monk Kidd. As you look for possible Roma background, not dispositive but interesting,  see the talent at the stringed instrument, by the character, June Boatwright.  The drive for independence from men, of June and her sister, August Boatwright.  The heritage of the women managing the household, and the men coming and going if they liked, with cultural support for that role, and in many Roma-descended people, a gender ritual separation, that may not just be slavery-related.  It may not just be because men were sold off - it can be part of a larger heritage, and one that enabled survival of a persecuted people through that thousand years.

American Roma.  Shall we open our eyes that we may see.

Roma. History of Persecution. Hate Crimes, Expulsions. Holocaust. Poverty: Survival Responses

Hate crimes
Holocaust

1. How to get at the scope of the persecutions against Roma. Narratives are fine, but timelines may give a better start. Overall fodder background discussion of those in any culture who are designated as fodder, expendable: The Common Good, Who Speaks for It.

According to this site, //www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/cultural/oldworld/europe/gypsy.html:

• France - expelled Roma from Paris 1539

• Spain - punitive laws 1492, after the Roma had lived free under Muslim rule

• England - forced out Roma in 1563, under threat of death (travel to Ireland, Wales, Scotland, then back?)

• Hungary, Romania - enslaved many in 14th Century to work the large estates

• Also says 500,000 killed in WWII Nazi camps (figures vary from 300,000 to a million - no birth or death records, figures not consistent in including the non-camp slaughter)

2. Timeline in history. See ://www.geocities.com/~Patrin/timeline.htm

3. The why of persecution and hate crimes - a start.

See a start at ://www3.baylor.edu/~Charles_Kemp/gypsy_health.htm, a site with information to help healthcare providers address needs of eastern European Roma -a cultural history, taboos, health issues and practices. That article gives some clues, from very specific legends, myths.

• Genesis 9:25 quoted there as applying to the Gypsies - (how could that be? Genesis and Roma??) "Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants He shall be to his brethren." The West can always find something in its scripture to justify anything. Is that so? Not in the Baylor article, but an observation.
  

• There is a legend in Balkans that Roma made the nails for the Crucifixion and/or stole the fourth nail, that would have hastened the process if it had been pounded in; so the Crucifixion was made more painful by the theft.
  

Rankism. See Common Dreams at ://www.commondreams.org/views05/0510-33.htm/ Rankism supplanting racism. The somebodies vs. the nobodies.

Rankism. Feeds a simple need for an undercaste. Why do cultures need an undercaste. Is it economic, the fear that, if any abundance is allowed them, above survival, it reduces what is available to others; or is it psychological, that if this person is down, at least I am up.

Poverty creates a permanent underclass that then defends itself as best it can, by whatever measures needed. See one analysis, shaky but in process, of groups and their interacting at Studying War. There is pressure to suppress, from governments, to leaders, to people acting to protect their lifestyles and positions on some ladder hierarchy; other behaviors develop in response. Gypsies have often been kept at bottom, at least since the 16th Century, some better conditions before then. Force theft to get the basics, then punish the theft, while withholding the acceptance and tolerance that would enable a a group to do otherwise? Is that it?

4. How did Jews and Gypsies survive at all, given the centuries of hate.

Look at this old text, from 1898, "The Jew, The Gypsy and El Islam," by Sir Richard F. Burton (it says he translated the 1001 Nights, etc,) that details understandings he researched at the time, for these particular groups. It is at ://www.jrbooksonline.com/PDFs/The%20Jew,%20the%20Gypsy%20and%20El%20Islam%20JR.pdf

Scroll down to page 160 ff, give or take. Note the cultural prejudices and derogatory attitude of this colonial era, and then the similarities between target groups, the Jews and the Gypsies.

Both been outcast, had their own customs, and in past times, an overall appearance that was overall different from the "aryan" and other European physical groups, each had its own language, own names.

Survival at all - how could they survive. But the site (again, this is 1898) notes that the wealth that the Jewish groups accumulated in developing financial and commercial skills, and settling down; brought on a corresponding backlash of persecutions and confiscation.

Look then at the poverty of the Gypsy. It actually gave some protection. They survived by language ties and consanguinity, not accumulating wealth and settling down. Full circle. Both were hated groups, opposite cultural responses toward their common enemy, one to become well-to-do, the other in poverty and transience, and continuing persecutions with each surviving in its way.

5. History of events.

At the "The Jew, the Gypsy and el Islam" site, also read of the migrations, reactions, Papal bulls against them, laws, etc. Go to page 200 or so. People have really worked at putting the story together, some things were right, some off base, but worth reading old sources.

Read about Gypsies in Spain, other parts of Europe, Africa, and contrast the state of Islam and Jewish traditions in the same volume.

Read "The Pariah Syndrome, A History of Gypsy Slavery and Persecution" by Ian Hancock, at http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5121/pariah-contents.htm. Find a detailed table of contents on background, practices in different locales.