In a message dated 12/6/2001 6:20:21 PM Central Standard Time, phma@oltronics.net writes:How do we distinguish Romany from Romanian (besides {tsingaro}, of course)? How did we get 'em confused in the first place? One is eccentric Romance, the eccentric Indic and, though I suppose the Dom came through Roumania on their way to Western Europe, I don't think they lingered there more than most places (til next week's pogrom). As far as I ever heard (never in ideals circumstances) the initial consonant in the Gypsy selfname is a retroflex voiced stop, whence the d/r variation. Maybe we can call them Doms (Indians regularly take English alveolars as retroflex since they are back of the native detnals). |