The Jew, The Gypsy and El IslamBurton, Richard Francis, Sir
Islamic
The Jew, The Gypsy and El Islam
Burton, Richard Francis, Sir
Islam; Jews; Romanies
Moreover, we are told, _if_ the modern Tsigane represent the Sinties
and the Siginnoi, they must, _ergo_, stand in the same relationship to
certain mysterious tribes inhabiting the Caucasus and Western Asia,
Egypt, the Levantine Islands, and the Danubian basin. Thus we see the
origin of the Telchini, the Chalybes, and other “Cabiric peoples.” The
latter has the disadvantage of being purely Semitic, Kabír meaning “the
great” applied to the twelve _Dii majores_ of the Phœnicians who sent
forth Kadmos (El Kadín) = the old or the great.[135] But let that pass.
Our author proves his fact by showing that these races, like the modern
Romá, were makers of weapons, especially the assegai or javelin; whilst
the Cabiri and the Telchini were renowned for music and soothsaying.
And how not recognize the Troglodytic Sibyls of Asia Minor and Egypt,
of Greece, and especially Thrace, in the pure Gypsy, when [Greek:
Σιβυλλα: Sibylla] is only a form of [Greek: Σιβυνη: Sibynê] or [Greek:
Ζιβυνη: Zibynê], which naturally derives from [Greek: Σιγυνη: Sigynê],
[Greek: Σιγυννος: Sigynnos] = _Tsigane_? How not perceive that the
Egyptian prophetesses turned into black pigeons by Herodotus, and the
doves of Dodona, were not identical with the Romní?
This becomes a disease--_Tsigane_ on the brain; from which our
author evidently suffers in an acute form--so acute as to render his
imagination most lively. To the unimaginative ethnologist the “Sindhi”
are simply the Sindh tribes of Gypsies, so called from the Sindhu, that
mighty stream which gave to Europe a name for the Indian Peninsula.
Hence, indeed, some philologists would derive the Spanish word Zincale
(Zinkale), making it a compound of Sindh and Kálo (plural Kále, black)
= dark men of Sindh. Rejecting this treatment, we must consider it a
tribal name like Karáchi (= lower Sindhian), Helebi (Aleppine), Lúri
(from Lúristán), and many others into which the great Jat nation is
divided.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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