This thesis seeks to compare and contrast the histories of two minorities in Europe, both living primarily in Eastern Europe and Russia, during the period from approximately 1000 CE to the present. It focuses on the histories of Ashkenazi Jews and Romani people from their earliest presence in Europe, and includes a literature review. Using a variety of primary and secondary sources, this project discusses the similarities and differences between the historical experience of both groups up to the present. From their arrival in the latter part of the Early Medieval Period (just prior to 1000), both groups begin a complex history of development and often tense relationships with surrounding peoples. Echoes of the medieval and early modern experiences of both groups still influence them today. By examining the commonalities and distinctions between these two ethnic groups, this project aims to shed light on the historical development of both.

Despite a long tradition of Jewish literacy, the Ashkenazi community did not keep any literary evidence of its original migration to Eastern Europe (Clark, 2014, p. 236). Since their arrival, genetic evidence indicates a low rate of intermarriage with outsiders. These studies have indicated that despite approximately a millennium of occupying Eastern Europe, only 5-8% of paternal DNA in Ashkenazi males comes from non-Jewish European ancestry (Clark, 2014, p. 237). By the twelfth century they had arrived in the Rhineland, along today’s German-French border (Costa et al., 2013), and later as their population grew from Germany into Poland-Lithuania (Bartal, 2005, p. 15).

The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was formed in 1368 (Frost, 2015, p. 50), and by the time its breakup in 1772, its Ashkenazi population made up a numerical majority of the Jews of Europe (Bartal, 2005, p. 1). These “Polish” Jews retained a significant degree of German culture (Bartal, 2005, p. 15), and maintained their distinction from the broader Polish culture (p. 16).

The name Rom(a) may derive from Ḍom, a landless caste in India who frequently lived in a migratory pattern (Matras, 2015, p. 18). An alternate hypothesis sees the Romani people emerging from the intermingling of several different Indian peoples living in Persia (Kenrick, 2004). Modern genetics has confirmed that Romanies are closely related traditionally to Scheduled Castes, the lowest-status groups in the traditional Hindu caste system (Rai et al., 2012). Linguistic evidence indicates that Romanies stayed for a time in Greece as they migrated westward, before moving into Eastern Europe (Matras, 2015, p. 19). Scholars place the arrival of Romani people in Europe in the thirteenth century (Hancock 1991, p. 4) or as early as the eleventh (2007, p. xvii).

While Romanies generally hail from India, economic historian Gregory Clark argues that this is not the case for the United Kingdom’s “Gypsy or Traveller” (Romanichal) people, who are ethnically British (2014, p. 240-43). Clark suggests that because of a lack of the visible features (darker skin, facial shape) common to other Romani groups, the “Gypsies” of England have seen large amounts of turn-over through the generations as people move from “Gypsy” life to mainstream society and vice versa (2014, p. 244). Unlike Romani populations in continental Europe, there have been no genetic studies of English “Gypsies,” so it remains to be seen whether such testing will vindicate Clark’s interpretation (2014, p. 243).

Ashkenazi Jews “are longstanding elites of a millennium or more” (Clark, 2014, p. 10). Despite a long history of persecutions and anti-Semitism, the demographic estimates implied by the majority view of Ashkenazi origins imply a population growth rate of over 50% each generation, an “extraordinary” rate given the stagnant populations of medieval Europe, rates similar to elite groups in England (Clark, 2014, p. 236).

In the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, the Jewish community was an international one, with travel, and trade crossing national boundaries (Katz, 1993, p. 7). While Jewish communities were internationally connected, locally Jews were segregated from the broader Christian population into segregated communities (sometimes referred to as “ghettos”), with almost the entire Ashkenazi population being restricted to particular parts of any given town or city (Katz, 1993, p. 11). In addition to physical separation, Jews were distinguished by speaking Yiddish and by their different clothing and hair-covering practices (Katz, 1993, p. 12).

Ashkenazi Jews were regarded as a “foreign” group in late medieval and early modern Europe, and were allowed to live in any area only by special permission of the local rulers, and not by legal right (Katz, 1993, p. 13). It was a generally accepted legal principle that rulers could revoke this permission at will and expel the local Jews, as sometimes occurred (Katz, 1993, pp. 14-16). Despite the precarious nature of Jewish residency rights, they were nonetheless encouraged to settle in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth because the Polish landed classes needed financing and help administering their financial affairs (Katz, 1993, p. 15). As the Polish nobility founded new towns in previously rural areas, their Jewish guests began to rent land from the nobles, which they used to manage a wide variety of agricultural and other economic enterprises (Bartal, 2005, p. 17). By the sixteenth century, Poland-Lithuania had become the cultural center of Ashkenazi Judaism (Bartal, 2005, p. 18). Economically, the Polish Jews were granted wide autonomy in terms of tax collection (Bartal, 2005, p. 21), and functioned as an elite class one step below the Christian nobility (Bartal, 2005, p. 159-161).

Intermediate in status between the land-owning nobility, which lived on rents, the peasantry, which survived through subsistence farming, Ashkenazi Jews came to dominate trade and finance in Eastern and Central Europe, not only in Poland-Lithuania but also in Germany. As a result, it became a popular stereotype that skill in business was “a uniquely Jewish characteristic” (Katz, 1993, p. 45). Because Jews did not own rural land, and because they did not have a recognized right to inhabit any part of Europe, they were politically powerless in a way that made them non-threatening to rulers. Paradoxically, this made rulers feel safe in entrusting economic responsibility to Jewish hands, contributing to Jewish economic success (Katz, 1993, p. 46).

The unique socioeconomic role of Ashkenazi Jews in the medieval world is summed up by Cochran, Hardy, and Harpending as follows: “For 800–900 years, from roughly AD 800 to AD 1650 or 1700, the great majority of the Ashkenazi Jews had managerial and financial jobs, jobs of high complexity, and were neither farmers nor craftsmen. In this they differed from all other settled peoples of which we have knowledge” (2006, p. 670).

Since the fourteenth century, observers have noticed that Romani people have tended not to have regular employment (Matras, 2015, p. 8). Nevertheless, Romani people traditionally had skills in metalworking and other economically valuable crafts, as a result of which they were widely enslaved (Matras, 2015, pp. 160-163). In the fourteenth, Romani slaves were being imported into what is now Romania (Matras, 2015, p. 23). Romanies were kept as slaves in Romania continuously until Romani slavery was finally abolished in the mid-nineteenth century (Crowe, 2007, p. xviii).

Stereotypically, “Gypsies” are associated with a nomadic lifestyle. While this is in fact not an accurate description as most Romani have historically lived in permanent settlements (Matras, 2015, p. 41), it does carry an element of truth. Historically, repeated expulsions by unfriendly local governments forced many Romani to adapt to life on the move (Hancock, 1991, p. 5). With time, nomadism became not just a reaction to expulsion, but for many Romani became a valued and traditional lifestyle (Crowe, 2007, p. 294). As the world has modernized, many governments have attempted to force nomadic Romani people to settle, but so far have these efforts have proved unsuccessful (Crowe, 2007, pp. xviii-xix, 295).

The social life of Romani people has historically been based on kinship ties between families (Matras, 2015, p. 27). Historically, Romani have not had any awareness of being a single group coming from a single place, and the various Romani groups have not had any shared religion or scripture (Matras, 2015, p. 30). Due to the traditional illiteracy of Romani people, memory of historical events more than one or two generations old has tended to fade (Matras, 2015, p. 42). However, while history has not been accurately recorded within Romani society, Romani customary law has been passed down orally, primarily by women, through the centuries (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 3). As noted above, the English “Gypsies” are of contested origin, and may not be biologically connected to the Romani population. However, their economic status has been similar, and they “have been at the bottom of the economic scale for more than four hundred years” (Clark, 2014, p. 10).

Traditional Jewish law, observed historically both by Ashkenazim and other Jews, is referred to as halakha (Katz, 1993). Halakha was a central part of the way that Jewish society “saw itself as based upon a body of knowledge and a set of values handed down to it from the past” (Katz, 1993, p. 1). Halakha developed through a series of works, each commenting on earlier works. The standard works of halakha include the legal material in the Bible itself (first millennium BCE), the Mishnah (c. 200 CE), the Talmud Bavli (c. 500 CE), the Mishneh Torah (twelfth century CE), and the Shulchan Aruch (sixteenth century) (Carmichael, 2001, pp. 118-120).

Chua and Rubenfeld, in their study of high-achieving minority groups, noted that traditional Jewish legal exegesis places a high value on impulse control. They cite the Talmud, Philo, and the standard Jewish legal code known as the Shulchan Aruch to show the ways in which traditional Jewish thought values non-impulsive, deliberate behavior (2014, pp. 138-140).

One ongoing concern of halakha is avoiding and purifying oneself from niddah, or ritual pollution (Carmichael, 2001, p. 122). Detailed Jewish laws concerning ritual purity effectively made it impossible for Jews to share meals with non-Jews, which created a sense of social distance (Katz, 1993, p. 20). Jewish law also created a sense of legal distance, as halakha contains prohibitions against turning over a Jew to non-Jewish authorities for prosecution (Berman, 2016), and even on teaching non-Jews about halakha itself (Feldman, 1993, p. 319).

Though today following halakha is largely a matter of choice for Orthodox Jews, historically many of the provisions of were legally enforced. Jews were granted the right to administer their own internal affairs, with powers extending even to the operation of Jewish-run prisons and the collection of taxes to support their internal governments (Katz, 1993, p. 65-75). Thus, while powerless in terms of the political structure of the surrounding society, Jews formed something of a parallel state within the state, providing self-government (Katz, 1993, pp. 76-87). Jewish communities also created a range of social, charitable, and guild institutions (Katz, 1993, pp. 132-140).

The customs and practices that make up the traditional Romani way of life are known as romanipen. Like the halakha, romanipen is concerned with the maintenance of ritual purity, which is safeguarded through a variety of rules concerning cleanliness, clothing, food preparation, and contact with non-Romani people, or gadjes (Hancock, 1991, p. 5).

The concern about ritual impurity dates back to India (Hancock, 1991, p. 5), and the state of defilement that Romani attempt to avoid is called marimé (Carmichael, 2001, p. 122). Because non-Romani people do not follow Romani purity laws, traditional Romanies to avoid physical contact with non-Romani people, who are thought to be able to transmit defilement through touch. Hancock believes that this avoidance behavior has likely contributed to anti-Roma hostility (1991, p. 6). In addition, detailed purity regulations as they pertain to food have historically prevented Romani people from sharing meals with non-Romani (Matras, 2015, pp. 87-90).

Maintenance of ritual purity has been especially difficult in cases where Romanies come in contact with the legal system. Dogs and cats transmit defilement, as does nakedness, so being searched by police dogs or strip-searched is problematic. In addition, the laws of food purity cause Romanies to starve in prison rather than pollute themselves with food handled by non-Romanies (Weyrauch, 2001, pp. 6-7). Needless to say, sex and marriage with non-Romanies is also forbidden under these laws (Carmichael, 2001, p. 121).

Unlike halakha, romanipen has historically been a “strictly oral” phenomenon, as the Romani people had no written documents of any kind (Matras, 2015, p. 39). It was traditionally kept secret from non-Romani, although there has more recently been some opening up and publications on Romani law are beginning to appear (Harris, 2001, pp. ix-x). While it is possible to speak generally about Romani law, because these traditions have been passed down among scattered communities without any standard written works throughout the entirety of Romani history, generalizations about Romani law will almost never apply to all Romani (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 2). However, evidence for the preservation of the broad contours of Romani law can be found in the Kaale Gypsies of Finland, whose version of Romani law is similar to other communities despite four hundred years of isolation (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 3).

Romanies have not maintained a clergy or organized religion of their own, although a set of generally accepted beliefs combining Christian and Hindu ideas is a feature of Roma culture (Hancock, 2002, pp. 74-75). According to academic historian Yaron Matras, Romanies have usually become members of the local religion, whether Christian or Muslim, but have maintained their own beliefs and relied on the local religion primarily to provide funeral services (2015, p. 118). Outsiders have therefore often viewed Romani religious adherence to Christianity as superficial (Matras, 2015, p. 118). Nevertheless, Romani activist Ruth Barnett has called the idea of Romani irreligion “the most pernicious myth about gypsies” in a recent work devoted to undermining stereotypes, and insists that most Romanies do in fact attend local congregations and adhere strongly to the religions that they are formally associated with (Barnett, 2013, p. 44). These stereotypes historically have had contradictory effects on relations with Romanies: on the one hand Christian rulers repeatedly discussed or ordered forced conversion of Romanies on the theory that they needed religion; on the other, Romanies were often barred from participation in the sacraments on the theory that they were too non-religious to participate (Fraser, 1999, pp. 184-185).

As a result of the holocaust, the majority of Ashkenazim today live in the United States or Israel (Tapper, 2016, p. 20). The socioeconomic status and achievements in both countries tend to follow the same lines observed in earlier history. The average net worth of American Jews was $443,000 as of 2004, compared to $99,500 in the general population (Chua & Rubenfeld, 2014, p. 7). Income of American Jewish households averages approximately $98,000 per year as of 2010, “almost twice the national median” (Chua & Rubenfeld, 2014, p. 43). In the United States, studies of Ashkenazi surnames have estimated that Ashkenazi Jews are overrepresented as physicians by a factor of six (Clark, 2014, p. 47). As of 1960, the average Sephardi (non-Ashkenazi) Jewish family in Israel had a household income of only 48% of the Ashkenazi average, a gap which has declined somewhat but is still noticeable today (Rattner & Fishman, 1998, p. 5). Globally, Jews are overrepresented among Nobel Prize winners by a factor of one hundred, comprising approximately 0.2% of people worldwide but collecting about 20% of Nobel Prizes (Chua & Rubenfeld, 2014, p. 54).

In modern America, rates of marriage to non-Jews have risen sharply since around 1970, and as of the end of the twentieth century nearly half of Jewish marriages were to non-Jews (Clark, 2014, p. 283). In Israel as well, intermarriage between Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews has been increasing (Goldberg, 1996, p. 40).

Literature by Romanies was first seriously produced in the Soviet Union in the 1920’s and 30’s (Crowe, 2007, p. xx). The Soviet Union began a widespread push to integrate Romani people into modern settled life, and to put an end to nomadism. The effort failed (Crowe, 2007, p. 175). Like Jews, Romani people were targeted during the holocaust, and large numbers were killed (Mayall, 2004, p. 235). Since then, Romani throughout Europe have continued to live in “appallingly low social, economic, and educational status” (Crowe, 2007, p. xxi), and have continued to live in tension with law enforcement (Taylor, 2014, pp. 187-234).

They continue to be associated with nomadism in the popular imagination, but about 80% of Romanies in Europe live in permanent settlements (Matras, 2015, p. 25), and less than 3% of American Romanies live in mobile homes (Hancock, 2002, p. 107). In Europe, among Romanies who continue to live nomadically or in caravans, many can only maintain their traditional lifestyle by breaking Europe’s land use laws, resulting in evictions and conflict with police (Taylor, 2014, pp. 187-234).

In the United Kingdom fully one-third of Romani adults had never attended school at all, and of those with some schooling the average student dropped out at thirteen years of age (Clark, 2014, p. 240). Illiteracy is the norm in many communities (Matras, 2015, p. 13; Taylor, 2014, pp. 215-16). Despite great challenges, many Romanies have clung successfully to significant portions of their traditional culture. Even in the United States, some continue speaking Romani “four or five generations” after their ancestors immigrated (Matras, 2015, p. 3).

For approximately a millennium, both Ashkenazim and Romanies have followed paths that contain clear parallels as well as stark distinctions. Both groups have struggled with outside prejudice since their arrival in Europe, and have at times been expelled and murdered by hostile governments. Both Romanies and Ashkenazim have maintained a history of strict endogamy, with their separation from outsiders reinforced by concerns about purity and food preparation. Both cultures have historically been characterized by distinctive patterns of economic engagement that have distinguished them from the broader society. Their continued sense of separation from the broader world has been supported both by the hostile policies of outsiders as well as the inner norms of each group. In the modern world, Ashkenazi integration has been much more successful than that of Romanies, who throughout Europe and the United States continue to experience severe hardship.

Given the qualitative nature of the project, this work is built on the foundation of researchers who discuss the broad scope of Ashkenazi and Romani history from the arrival of both groups in Europe until the present day. In addition to books which provide broad overviews of the history of these peoples, a variety of studies (especially in genetics) and more specialized volumes have been consulted, on subjects such as the historical customs of both groups and comparative law. The research is based on the extensive literature cited in previous chapters, and guided by the sub-questions considered for analysis. With any ethnographic study of this kind, an element of subjectivity is inevitably involved, as the researcher must make determinations as to what sorts of causal explanations are more or less plausible in light of the data. However, this subjective element is constrained by the existence of significant quantities of primary source documents and on genetic and statistical data. By weighing the available evidence, at least a plausible set of answers to the sub-questions may be found.

(1) In what ways are the earliest origins of both peoples in Europe similar and different? Although research into the earliest origins of Ashkenazi and Romani people is hampered by a lack of primary source documents for the earliest stages of their presence in Europe, the origins of both groups can be compared in light of genetic data as well as the comparative study of linguistics and the legal traditions of both groups. The legal traditions of Ashkenazim are rooted in pre-Ashkenazi Jewish documents, including the previously mentioned Bible and Talmud. While such documentation does not extend as far back for the Romanies due to an oral tradition without a long history of literacy, examining the case of the Kaale Romanies in Finland can be used to establish the stability of Romani traditions. The Finnish Romanies preserved a similar way of life to other Romani groups despite four hundred years of isolation, indicating that many features of Romani culture observed today are stable across centuries. In addition, genetic studies show the common origin of Romani groups (with the possible exception of Great Britain’s Romanichals) in India, where comparative ethnographic works indicates that the Indian populations most closely related to modern Romanies lived an economically and socially similar lifestyle.

(2) In what ways have internal factors (such as Ashkenazi and Romani culture) and external factors (such as outside policies towards Jews and Romanies) contributed to both groups maintaining a distinct cultural identity? Ashkenazi and Romani culture can be studied through the use of a variety of primary and secondary sources which have documented the distinctive characteristics of both groups across centuries and in multiple countries. The literature on the legal traditions of both groups provides a number of ways in which the customary practices of both groups plausibly contributed to their continued existence as distinct peoples despite their scattered demographic presence in Europe. Outside policies towards both are likewise well-documented, allowing researchers to come to an understanding of the impacts of policies such as expulsions and discriminatory regulations on both groups. In seeking to evaluate possible explanations for the continued existence of both distinct cultures, special attention is given to factors shared by both cultures, as these factors may be more likely to explain similarities in the outcomes of both cultures.

(3) How have European cultures and governments responded to the presence of Ashkenazi and Romani people in Eastern Europe? Just as the legal and historical material mentioned above can be useful in explaining the continued existence of both groups as distinct cultures, the same sources of information are useful in describing the ways in which outsiders have responded to the presence of these ethnic groups. This sub-question includes not only legal documents documenting governmental behavior, but also sources which illustrate the attitudes and stereotypes about Jews and Romanies that have been common in the surrounding culture. Comparing the information gathered in these first three sub-questions produces a substantial knowledge base of information useful in answering the several facets of the fourth sub-question, addressed next.

(4) What differences in the history of the two groups have contributed to the very different situations of Ashkenazim and Romani in the modern world? Providing plausible answers to this questions requires drawing on the broad set of resources used in answering the previous questions discussed above. In addition to the historical work mentioned above, this section relies on statistical work and ethnographic reports that have documented the present social and economic status of Ashkenazim and Romanies in the United States and Europe. Where the results of these statistical studies and ethnographic reports regarding the more recent status of Ashkenazi and Romani populations can be plausibly correlated with the historical factors identified through the research on the previous three sub-questions, this study will then attempt to examine those possible causes, weighing their significance, and provide, as far as possible, a reasonable explanation for how Romanies and Ashkenazim have come to their present positions in the contemporary world.

As outlined above, the comparison of Ashkenazi and Romani history contains a significant subjective element of personal judgment, but is grounded in several overlapping kinds of data: ethnographic, historical, legal, and statistical. To the extent that it is possible, the use of objective data mitigates the pitfalls inherent in the subjective judgment that is an inevitable part of historical reasoning. This multi-disciplinary approach gives the best possible chance of coming to well-founded conclusions in this complex and sometimes contested field. Drawing on the extensive previous literature on Ashkenazim, and the emerging field of Romani Studies, this study attempts to explain the present in an informed historical manner.

(1) In what ways are the earliest origins of both peoples in Europe similar and different?

While records concerning Ashkenazim and Romanies both appear in Europe in the early second millennium C.E., the Ashkenazim emerged as a subset of the Jewish population, whose earliest presence was recorded over one thousand years earlier, extending as far back as the Bible and Hellenistic writers (Gruens, 2002). While the Ashkenazi community has no surviving records of their original migration to Eastern Europe (Clark, 2014, p. 236), genetic evidence allows researchers to definitively trace their ancestry. This evidence indicates that after their separation from the broader Jewish population, the Ashkenazi population maintained a high degree of ethnic separation, with only 5-8% of paternal DNA in Ashkenazi males indicating non-Jewish European ancestry (Clark, 2014, p. 237). Their population arrived in the Rhineland, along the German-French border, by the twelfth century (Costa et al., 2013), and as their numbers grew they began a continual process of eastward expansion, with large numbers eventually living in Poland-Lithuania (Bartal, 2005, p. 15).

Though their history is lacking in the extensive tradition of literature common to the Jewish people, genetic and linguistic evidence has been used to reconstruct the earliest history of the Romani people, although some details remain contested. Yaron Matras, the editor of the journal Romani Studies, derives the name Rom(a) from Dom, the name of a caste in India who were forbidden to own land and who frequently lived in a migratory manner, moving in search of employment in an economic pattern similar to that of later Romanies (2015, p. 18). An alternate view sees the Romanies as emerging from the intermingling of several different Indian peoples living in Persia (Kenrick, 2004). Regardless of scholarly differences of opinion as the exact nature of the early Romani population, modern genetics has confirmed that Romanies are closely related to peoples ancestral to India’s contemporary Scheduled Castes, the lowest-status groups in the traditional Hindu caste system (Rai et al., 2012). Linguistic evidence indicates that during the pre-European migrations of Romani people, the Romanies spent a significant amount of time in Greece (Matras, 2015, p. 19). Their entry into Europe is variantly dated depending on the interpretation of early documents describing Romani people, with estimates of their earliest presence in Europe ranging from the eleventh or twelfth century (Crowe, 2007, p. xvii), or to the thirteenth century (1991, p. 4).

Although generally speaking Romani populations are traced to India, economic historian Gregory Clark argues that this is not the case for the United Kingdom’s “Gypsy or Traveller” (Romanichal) people (2014, p. 240). On the basis of physical characteristics as well as an analysis of surnames found in census data, Clark argues that this population is ethnically British, but have adopted a mythological Romani identity on the basis of economic and social similarities (2014, p. 240-243). In addition, Clark suggests that because of a lack of the visible features (darker skin, facial shape) common to other Romani groups, the “Gypsies” of England have seen large-scale turn-over as people move from “Gypsy” to mainstream society and vice versa (2014, p. 244). There have, however, been no genetic studies of the “Gypsy” population in the United Kingdom to confirm or deny Clark’s interpretation (2014, p. 243).

(2) In what ways have internal factors (such as Ashkenazi and Romani culture) and external factors (such as outside policies towards Jews and Romanies) contributed to both groups maintaining a distinct cultural identity?

While maintaining an endogamous, separate identity, the Ashkenazi population expanded into the Poland-Lithuanian Commonwealth during its existence from its formation in 1368 (Frost, 2015, p. 50), to its dissolution in 1772, by which point the majority of Ashkenazi Jews were living within its borders (Bartal, 2005, p. 1).

Despite their long tenure in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Ashkenazim maintained the cultural identity they had formed in Germany, continuing to speak Yiddish, a distinctly Jewish dialect of German (Bartal, 2005, p. 15-16). In addition to Yiddish, Jews were conspicuously distinguished from non-Jews by their different clothing, hair-cutting, and hair-covering practices (Katz, 1993, p. 12). In Poland-Lithuania and elsewhere in Europe, Jews were considered, even after hundreds of years in Europe, as an ethnically and religiously “foreign group” of guests by the surrounding Christian population, which considered itself to be the native and indigenous population of Europe with a stronger right to live in the land (Katz, 1993, p. 13). Despite their exclusion from legal rights, the Polish nobility encouraged the presence of Jews in order to provide financing and business administration (Katz, 1993, p. 15). Jews came to function as an economically elite class, one step below the nobility, but well above the mass of Polish peasants (Bartal, 2005, p. 159-161). By the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, the Jewish community had strong international ties, with travel, trade, and even charitable aid crossing national boundaries (Katz, 1993, p. 7).

Traditional Jewish law, observed historically by both Ashkenazim and other Jews, is referred to as halakha (Katz, 1993). Historically, halakha was a central part of the way that Jewish society “saw itself as based upon a body of knowledge and a set of values handed down to it from the past” (Katz, 1993, p. 1). Halakha has developed through a series of works, each of which comments on earlier works. The standard halakhic literature includes the legal material in the Bible itself (first millennium BCE), the Mishnah (c. 200 CE), the Talmud Bavli (c. 500 CE), the Mishneh Torah (twelfth century CE), and the Shulchan Aruch (sixteenth century) (Carmichael, 2001, pp. 118-120).

Chua and Rubenfeld, in their study of high-achieving minority groups in the United States, have noted that traditional Jewish legal exegesis places a high value on impulse control. They cite the Talmud, the Hellenistic Jewish author Philo, and the standard Jewish legal code known as the Shulchan Aruch to illustrate ways in which traditional Jewish thought values non-impulsive, deliberate behavior (2014, p. 138-140).

One ongoing concern of halakha is avoiding and purifying oneself from niddah, or ritual pollution (Carmichael, 2001, p. 122). Detailed Jewish laws concerning ritual purity effectively made it impossible for Jews to share meals with non-Jews, which created a sense of social distance (Katz, 1993, p. 20). Jewish law also created a sense of legal distance, as halakha contains prohibitions against turning over a Jew to non-Jewish authorities for prosecution (Berman, 2016), and even against teaching non-Jews about halakha itself (Feldman, 1993, p. 319).

Though following halakha is today largely a matter of choice for Orthodox Jews, historically many its provisions were legally enforced. Due to the segregated nature of Ashkenazi Jewish life, Jews were granted the right to administer their own internal affairs at the municipal level, with powers so broad that they extended even to the operation of their own communal prisons and the collection of taxes to support their local Jewish governments (Katz, 1993, pp. 65-75). In addition to civil and criminal penalties resembling a modern legal system, Jewish self-government has also relied upon herem, a decree by a legal court that mandated that a malefactor be excommunicated religiously and shunned by other Jews (Wright, 2012, p. 65). Thus, while powerless in terms of the political structure of the surrounding society, Jews formed something like a parallel state within the state, providing self-government within a theocratic structure (Katz, 1993, pp. 76-87). The Jewish communities also created a range of social, charitable, and guild institutions, known as havurot (Katz, 1993, pp. 132-140).

The social life of Romani people has historically been based on kinship ties between families (Matras, 2015, p. 27). In the case of the Vlach Rom, the largest Romani population, the kinship structure is very elaborate. Each Romani person belongs to a familia, a unit somewhat larger than the nuclear family, with several familia making up a vitsa, several vitsa making up a natsiya, and four natsiya making up the Vlach population as a whole (Friedman, 2017, p. 2). Running parallel to this hierarchical kinship system is the organization of Vlach Romanies into kumpania, geographically-based groups which usually each have a male leader known as a Rom Baro. A kumpania may include members of one or more vitsa depending on the locally recognized rules which govern it (Friedman, 2017, p. 3). Among Vlach Romanies, conflicts arising within or between kinship groups are traditionally dealt with through a kris, or Romani judicial assembly (Friedman, 2017, p. 4). The decisions of a kris are enforced through a variety of legal and extra-legal means, prominently including shunning of offenders — a kris can legally declare an offender to be ritually polluted, leading to a ostracism (Friedman, 2017, p. 6).

Historically, Romanies have not had any awareness of being a single group coming from a single place, and the various Romani groups have not had any shared religion or scripture (Matras, 2015, p. 30). Due to the traditional illiteracy of the Romani people, memories of historical events more than one or two generations in the past have tended to fade (Matras, 2015, p. 42). However, while historical memory has not been accurately preserved in Romani society, Romani customary law has been passed down orally, primarily by women, through the centuries (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 3).

The totality of customs and practices that make up the traditional Romani way of life are known as romanipen. Like the halakha, romanipen is concerned with the maintenance of ritual purity, which is safeguarded through a variety of rules concerning cleanliness, clothing, food preparation, and contact with non-Romani peoples, or gadjes (Hancock, 1991, p. 5).

The concern about ritual purity dates back to India (Hancock, 1991, p. 5), and the state of defilement or pollution which the Romani attempt to avoid is known as marimé (Carmichael, 2001, p. 122). Because non-Romanies do not follow Romani purity laws, it is a matter of principle for traditional Romanies to avoid physical contact with non-Romanies, who are believed to transmit marimé by touch. Hancock believes that this avoidance behavior has likely contributed to anti-Romani hostility (1991, p. 6). In addition, detailed purity regulations pertaining to food have historically prevented Romani people from sharing meals with non-Romanies (Matras, 2015, pp. 87-90). The fear of contamination by non-Romani people has been so strong that upon moving into rental properties Romanies have even been known to replace toilets and sinks (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 4). David D. Friedman, an economist and legal scholar, describes these purity laws as “Orthodox Judaism on steroids,” and provides an account of how the fear of cross-contamination leads traditional Romanies to use six different tubs for washing: one each for “men’s lower garments, men’s upper garments, women’s lower garments, men’s upper garments, children’s garments, and eating utensils” (2017, p. 4).

Maintenance of ritual purity has been especially difficult in cases of Romanies coming in contact with the legal system. Physical contact with dogs and cats creates defilement, as does nakedness, so being searched by police dogs or strip-searched is a serious matter for Romanies. In addition, the food purity laws cause Romanies to starve in prison rather than risk acquiring pollution from the non-Romani kitchen staff (Weyrauch, 2001, pp. 6-7). Needless to say, sex and marriage with non-Romanies is forbidden under these laws (Carmichael, 2001, p. 121).

In addition to purity laws, the other major category of Romani law consists of “the obligations of Romani to each other, including extensive obligations of mutual help, especially but not exclusively between relatives” (Friedman, 2017, p. 3). These mutual obligations include assistance for impoverished relatives and collective fund-raising for medical care, religious feasts, and funerals (Friedman, 2017, p. 3).

Unlike halakha, romanipen has historically been a “strictly oral” phenomenon, as the Romani people until recently have had no written documents (Matras, 2015, p. 39). However, similar to halakha, it was traditionally kept “absolutely” secret from non-Romani, although there has more recently been some opening up, and publications on Romani law are beginning to appear (Harris, 2001, pp. ix-x). While it is possible to speak generally about Romani law, generalizations about Romani law will almost never apply universally, because these traditions have been passed down orally among scattered communities throughout the entire history of Romanies (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 2). However, evidence for the more or less accurate preservation of the broad contours of Romani law can be found, for example, among the Kaale Gypsies of Finland, whose version of Romani law is similar to that of other communities despite four hundred years of isolation (Weyrauch, 2001, p. 3). While the Kaale do have distinct practices with regard to rearing children and marriage, these differences are an extension of the concerns about sexual defilement that are found among other Romanies (Friedman, 2017, p. 7-8).

Unlike Jews, Romanies have not maintained a clergy or organized religion of their own, although Romanies do tend to hold to a set of generally accepted beliefs combining Christian and Hindu ideas (Hancock, 2002, pp. 74-75). According to historian Yaron Matras, Romanies have usually become members of the local religion, whether Christian or Muslim, but have maintained their own beliefs and relied on local religion primarily to provide funeral services (Matras, 2015, p. 118).

(3) How have European cultures and governments responded to the presence of Ashkenazi and Romani people in Eastern Europe?

While Jewish communities were internationally connected, locally they were segregated, legally restricted to particular quarters of towns (sometimes referred to as “ghettoes”), creating a situation in which almost the entire Ashkenazi population lived in neighborhoods solely populated by other Ashkenazim (Katz, 1993, p. 11). Legally, Ashkenazi Jews were not considered to have any legal right to reside anywhere in Europe, but were generally tolerated at the discretion of local rulers, not possessing the land tenure rights that extended even to the Christian peasant underclass (Katz, 1993, p. 13). As a result, European rulers considered themselves legally entitled to expel Jews at will (Katz, 1993, pp. 14-16).

Despite the precarious legal status of Jews in Europe, the Polish land-owning nobility which ruled Poland-Lithuania utilized the talents of Ashkenazim as they founded new towns in previously rural areas by renting land to Jews, who then managed a wide variety of agricultural and other economic enterprises (Bartal, 2005, p. 18). Poland-Lithuania’s Jews were granted wide autonomy in tax-collection, so that the nobility simply levied a single collective tax on the Jews of each area, giving the Jewish community wide discretion in collecting the tax from individuals (Bartal, 2005, p. 21). Jews came to dominate trade and finance in Eastern and central Europe both in Poland-Lithuania and in Germany. As a result, it became a popular stereotype that skill in business was a “uniquely Jewish characteristic” (Katz, 1993, p. 45). Because they did not own rural land, and because they did not have a recognized right to inhabit any part of Europe, they were politically powerless in a way that made them non-threatening to rulers. Paradoxically, this made rulers feel safe in entrusting economic responsibility to Jewish hands, contributing to Jewish economic success (Katz, 1993, p. 46).

Like Jews, Romani people have been subject to repeated expulsions by hostile European governments (Hancok, 1991, p. 5). While governmental coercion was applied to force settled Romanies to move out of areas, the opposite has occurred as well. Especially as the world has economically modernized, many governments have attempted to force traditionally nomadic Romanies to settle, but so far these efforts have been generally unsuccessful (Crowe, 2007, pp. xviii-xiv, 295).

Because of their practice of formally joining the predominant local religion but maintaining their traditional beliefs and practices, outsiders have frequently viewed Romani religious adherence to Christianity as lacking in genuineness (Matras, 2015, p. 118). Romani activist Ruth Barnett has called the idea of Romani irreligion “the most pernicious myth about gypsies” in a recent work devoted to undermining stereotypes, and insists, in contrasts to the claims of Hancock and Matras, that most Romanies do in fact attend local congregations and adhere strongly to the religions to which they are formally affiliated (2013, p. 44). These stereotypes historically have had contradictory effects on relations with Romanies: on the one hand Christian rulers repeatedly ordered forced conversion of Romanies on the theory that they needed religion; on the other, Romanies were often barred from participation in religious rituals on the theory that they were too inherently heathen to be permitted access to the church (Fraser, 1999, pp. 184-185).

(4) What differences in the history of the two groups have contributed to the very different situations of Ashkenazim and Romani in the modern world?

One indicator of the very different statuses of Ashkenazi and Romani people in the modern world lies in the different level of attention they receive academically. While academic departments of Jewish Studies can be found in great numbers, the field of Romani Studies is still emerging. As of 1991, Romani scholar Ian Hancock claimed that works on Romani “social issues . . . may be counted on the fingers of one hand” (p. 3). More recently there has been a significant uptick in scholarly interest in the Romani, but the field is still small and fragmented (Matras, 2015, pp. 34-35). This disparity in modern attention to Ashkenazim and Jews is matched by a similarly wide disparity in the historical production of literature by Ashkenazim and Romanies. Jewish literature has been prolific and continuously produced for over two thousand years, including, in chronological order, the Tanakh (known as the Old Testament or most of the Old Testament by various Christian groups), the Mishnah, the Talmud, the famous medieval commentaries by Rashi and Maimonides, the Shulchan Aruch, and the voluminous responsa literature produced by rabbis from the middle ages to the present day. Meanwhile, significant literary output by Romanies has only occurred since the 1920’s (Cederberg, 2006, p. 121-122).

The differences reflected in literature likewise match differences in observed socioeconomic status, both historically and in the modern world. Throughout their tenure in Europe, Ashkenazi Jews “are longstanding elites of a millennium or more” (Clark, 2014, p. 10). Despite a long history of anti-Semitic persecuation, the demographic estimates implied by the majority view of Ashkenazi origins imply a population growth rate of over 50% each generation, an “extraordinary” rate given the stagnant populations of medieval Europe. These rates, implying a much higher rate of child survival than found in the surrounding impoverished populations, are consistent with the sorts of rates observed in highly elite subpopulations in medieval England (Clark, 2014, p. 236).

By the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, the Jewish diaspora was internationally connected, with travel, trade, and even charitable aid crossing national boundaries (Katz, 1993, p. 7). However, long before this Ashkenazi Jews were socially and economically outliers in Europe. The unique socioeconomic role of Ashkenazim in Europe in the medieval world is summed up by Cochran, Hardy, and Harpending as follows: “For 800-900 years, from roughly AD 800 to AD 1650 or 1700, the great majority of the Ashkenazi Jews had managerial and financial jobs, jobs of high complexity, and were neither farmers nor craftsmen. In this they differed from all other settled peoples of which we have knowledge” (2006, p. 670).

Due to the killings and emigration occurring as a result of the holocaust, the majority of Ashkenazim today live in the United States or Israel (Tapper, 2016, p. 20). The socioeconomic status and achievements in both countries tend to follow the same lines observed in earlier history. The average net worth of American Jews was 443,000 as of 2004, compared to 99,500 in the general population (Chua & Rubenfeld, 2014, p. 7). Income of American Jewish households averaged approximately $98,00 per year as of 2010, “almost twice the national median” (Chua and Rubenfeld, 2014, p. 43). In the United States, studies of Ashkenazi surnames have been used to estimate that Ashkenazi Jews are overrepresented as physicians by a factor of six (Clark, 2014, p. 47). As of 1960, the average Sephardi (non-Ashkenazi) Jewish family in Israel had a household income of only 48% of the Ashkenazi average, a gap which has declined somewhat but is still noticeable today (Rattner & Fishman, 1998, p. 5). Globally, Jews are overrepresented among Nobel Prize winners by a factor of one hundred, comprising approximately 0.2% of people worldwide but collecting about 20% of Nobel Prizes (Chua & Rubenfeld, 2014, p. 54).

Although strict endogamy was the norm historically, in modern America rates of marriage to non-Jews have risen sharply since around 1970, and as of the end of the twentieth century nearly half of Jewish marriages were to non-Jews (Clark, 2014, p. 283). In Israel as well, intermarriage between Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews has been increasing (Goldberg, 1996, p. 40).

The historical experience of the Romanies has been a very different matter. Since the late fourteenth century, observers have noted that Romani people have tended not to have regular employment (Matras, 2015, p. 8). On the other hand, Romani people traditionally have had skills in metallurgy and other economically valuable crafts, as a result of which they were widely enslaved (Matras, 2015, pp. 160-163). In the fourteenth century, Romani slaves were being imported into what is now Romania (Matras, 2015, p. 23). Romanian Romanies were kept in slavery until its abolition in the mid-nineteenth century (Crowe, 2007, p. xviii).

In some cases, however, Romanies were given a degree of autonomy. The earliest (fifteenth century) records of Romanies in Western Europe, for example, “describe them as traveling through Europe bearing letters of safe conduct from [Holy Roman Emperor] Sigismund giving them judicial autonomy, the right to be punished only by their own authorities” (Friedman, 2017, p. 1). Likewise, in the late eighteenth century, Michael Sutsu, a Moldavian prince, ordered that Romanies were to judge their own conflicts, “and the governors and other dignitaries are not to interfere unless there is a death case” (as cited in Friedman, 2017, p. 10). The grants of judicial autonomy were similar to the status of European Jews in pre-modern Europe (Friedman, 2017, p. 1). Even in the case of what Matras and Crowe describe as “slavery” in Romania, and what Friedman describes as “enserfment,” some degree of freedom was sometimes achieved. Some Romanian Romanies, despite being theoretically serfs tied to the land with an owner, instead lived by an arrangement in which they roamed freely but paid annual feudal “dues” to their master in exchange for the right to mobility (Friedman, 2017, p. 10).

Stereotypically, “Gypsies” are associated with a nomadic lifestyle. While this is in fact not an accurate description as most Romani have historically lived in permanent settlements (Matras, 2015, p. 41), it does have an element of truth, as a result of the possible Dom heritage and the repeated expulsions which forced Romanies to adjust to life on the move (Hancock, 1991, p. 5). In addition to being a survival tactic, nomadism for many Romani has been a valued traditional lifestyle (Crowe, 2007, p. 294). As previously mentioned, the English “Gypsies” are of contested origin, and may not be biologically connected to the Romani population. However, their economic status has been similar, and they “have been at the bottom of the economic scale for more than four hundred years” (Clark, 2014, p. 10).

The beginnings of Romani literacy saw a first flowering of Romani literature in the Soviet Union in the 1920’s and 30’s (Crowe, 2007, p. xx). The Soviet Union began a widespread push to integrate Romani people into modern settled life, and to put an end to nomadism. This effort failed. One Romani interviewed by a Soviet researcher, invoking stereotypes about both Jews and his own people, is on record as stating, “We are not trained to till the land, and we are not as clever as Jews; we cannot change so easily” (Crowe, 2007, p. 175). Like Jews, Romani people were targeted during the holocaust, and large numbers were killed (Mayall, 2004, p. 235). However, a noteworthy difference is that while Nazi Germany managed the systematic extermination of six million Jews, a smaller proportion of Romanies were killed. Friedman raises the possibility that the relative success of Roma in evading genocide may be due to the traditional Romani practice of avoiding registration with governments, or of providing false names when recorded contact with governments is unavoidable, making it very difficult for a central government to systematically hunt for Romanies (2017, pp. 11-12).

Since then, Romanies throughout Europe have continued to live in “appallingly low social, economic, and educational status” (Crowe, 2007, p. xxi), and have continued to live in tension with law enforcement (Taylor, 2014, pp. 187-234). Although some Romanies have begun to organize politically since the 1970’s (Matras, 2015, p. 31), conditions are still daunting. In recent decades, estimates for Eastern Europe place Romani adult unemployment rates around 80% (Taylor, 2014, p. 222). Hancock has noted that life expectancies for Romanies are lower than for their surrounding societies: 15 years lower in Hungary, and an average lifespan between 48 and 55 years in the United States (1999, p. 7). Similarly, Gregory Clark relates that the United Kingdom’s “Gypsy” community has infant mortality rates roughly 20 times those of the surrounding population, and their lives are on average ten years shorter (p. 240). Romanies still tend to avoid modern medical care due to a fear of contracting ritual impurity in the hospital environment (Hancock, 2002, p. 88). Although statistics concerning Romanies are difficult to verify because of difficulties involved in gathering data on a poorly understood population, the literature on Romanies is consistent in the picture portrayed, of a population severely marginalized in economic, educational, and social terms. The population itself is so poorly measured that estimates of the number of Romanies worldwide range from 3 to 15 million (Friedman, 2017, p. 1).

They continue to be associated with nomadism in the popular imagination, but about 80% of Romanies in Europe live in permanent settlements (Matras 2015, p. 25), and less than 3% of American Romanies live in mobile homes (Hancock, 2002, p. 107). In Europe, among Romanies who continue to live nomadically or in caravans, many can only maintain their traditional lifestyles by breaking Europe’s land use laws, resulting in evictions and conflict with police (Taylor, 2014, pp. 187-234). In 2011, a controversial incident resulted in eighty families being evicted from their own (legally owned) land in England due to failure to complete required government paperwork (Taylor, 2014, p. 227).

In the United Kingdom fully one-third of Romani adults have never attended school at all, and of those with some schooling the average student dropped out at thirteen years of age (Clark, 2014, p. 240). Yaron Matras reports contact with a Romani community in England of which no adult member was literate (2015, p. 13). Similarly, Becky Taylor reports, in an interview with a Romanichal man who left school at age seven, that he saw no need for reading because not a single person he knew was literate (Taylor, 2014, p. 215). In Bulgaria, a successful 1980’s reorganization of schools to provide vocational training resulted in the number of students continuing education after primary school rising to 25-30%, with similar figures reported in other parts of Eastern Europe (Taylor, 2014, p. 216). In Hamburg, Germany, a survey of Romani people in the early 1980’s failed to find a single high school graduate (Taylor, 2014, p. 215). While intermarriage between Ashkenazim and other Jews or non-Jews has become commonplace, social acceptance for Romanies has been slower to develop, with majorities in some countries as high as 85% having unfavorable views of Roma (“EU image,” p. 5). On average only 19% of Europeans surveyed by Pew Research say they would be willing to “accept” Romanies “as family members” (“Religious Belief,” 2017).

Despite great challenges, many Romanies have clung successfully to significant portions of their traditional culture. Even in the United States, some continue speaking Romani “four or five generations” after their ancestors immigrated (Matras, 2015, p. 3).

This project seeks to compare and contrast the histories of two minorities in Europe, both living primarily in Eastern Europe and what is now Russia, during the period from approximately 1000 CE to the present. From their arrival in Europe around 1000 CE, both groups begin a complex history of development and often tense relationships with the surrounding population. By examining the commonalities and distinctions between these two ethnic groups, this project aims to shed light on the historical development of both. The broader question to be addressed is, “How does the history of Ashkenazi Judaism, from roughly 1000 CE to the present, primarily in Eastern Europe and what is now Russia, compare to the history of the Romanies (commonly referred to as “Gypsies”) in the same area and period?” This broader question is addressed by means of a series of more narrowly focused sub-questions:

1. In what ways are the earliest origins of both peoples in Europe similar and different?
2. In what ways have internal factors (such as Ashkenazi and Romani culture) and external factors (such as outside policies towards Jews and Romanies) contributed to both groups maintaining a distinct cultural identity?
3. How have European cultures and governments responded to the presence of Ashkenazi and Romani people in Eastern Europe?
4. What differences in the history of the two groups have contributed to the very different situations of Ashkenazim and Romanies in the modern world?

As discussed in Chapter 3, the methodology required for this project is fundamentally an ethnographic and historical one. It is qualitative in nature, but also makes use of genetic and statistical data in order to measure relevant aspects of the history of both groups. Thus this project relies on a mixture of qualitative and quantitative approaches, with the amount of quantitative data rising later in the history of both groups as modern states and non-governmental organizations begin to keep more extensive statistical records. Because the subject is extremely broad, the project relies in part on books which provide broad overviews of both groups, along with more specialized books and journal articles which focus on narrower problems germane to this project. In any project of this kind, some degree of subjectivity is unfortunately inevitable, but the use of subjective assessment is constrained by the quantitative and historical data available.

For sub-question (1), the earliest histories of both groups are reconstructed through the use of genetic data and the extensive primary sources produced by Ashkenazim, although such written records are not available for most of Romani history. While Romani documentation is often lacking, the substantially similar oral traditions of Finnish Kaale Romanies despite centuries of isolation provide a strong argument for the historical maintenance of Romani culture. For sub-question (2), the traditions of both groups provide relevant information, and outside policies are well-documented by medieval and modern governments. Sub-question (3) is answered by examination of the records about both groups produced by outsiders, which document the ways that outside governments and cultures have responded to Ashkenazi and Romani people. For sub-question (4), the greatest quantity of material is available, as the modern world has taken a greater interest in statistically and legally documenting matters related to minority groups. Universities have also taken a historically strong interest in Jewish matters, while Romani Studies has been emerging over the past few decades.

The various sorts of data collected, most fully described in Chapters 2 and 4, paint a picture of two cultures whose modern situation is related to long-persistent cultural characteristics not only observable over nearly one thousand years in Eastern Europe, but which are also visible in the present day in the diasporas of both groups, and which are even to a significant degree visible in the pre-European history of the ancestors of both groups. The tenaciousness of millennia-old cultural distinctions is surprising, and adds a helpful corrective to any attempts to understand Jewish and Romani cultures through observations that might merely include their recent history and interactions with other groups.

Also surprising is the degree to which the maintenance of cultural barriers has been a “shared project” in a sense, between each group and the outside culture. While outside cultures have been often unfriendly to both, sometimes to the extent of enslavement and mass murder, there has been in a certain sense of the word “cooperation” in more ordinary times, in that both inside and outside the groups people have made efforts that contribute to the maintenance of these cultural distinctions. Both groups show a long-held desire not to mingle with the broader European world, and the broader European world has enthusiastically reciprocated the sentiment. In a strictly economic and academic sense, Ashkenazim and Romanies might be looked on generally as “opposites” in that while Ashkenazim show a very surprising level of high performance in the modern world, and Romanies show a surprisingly low level of success by conventional economic and academic measures.

However, in cultural terms the similarities between the groups are just as surprising. Both groups have used a variety of tactics to separate themselves from an often hostile world which has historically had very different values from their own, and have demonstrated a strong desire to maintain their way of life and to be governed in terms of their own traditions. Negotiating legal autonomy, avoiding the European governmental court systems, maintaining strict purity codes, and limiting the flow of information to outsiders mark both groups. Romanies show every sign of maintaining their traditional way of life even at a high price, and Orthodox Ashkenazim continue to do the same, even after both groups were targeted for their differences in the holocaust and over centuries.

Where previous works have occasionally compared Ashkenazi and Romani history, this project pushes further, and attempts to connect both the internal cultural practices of both groups and their place within the broader framework of medieval Eastern Europe to the history of their Jewish and Indian antecedents and their status in the modern world. It argues for a picture of internal and external forces as being intertwined in the production and maintenance of cultural distinctions, and argues for a view which sees modern outcomes as the product of extremely tenacious deep historical precedents. The conclusions this work have come to complement and extend the broad overview provided in Chapter 2. While it is no doubt desirable and useful to come to an understanding of particular times and places, such as the Romanies of Finland today, or the status of Ashkenazim in modern Israel, this project suggests that these specific modern settings are only comprehensible in light of deep and tenacious historical trends.

This project set out to compare and contrast the histories of Ashkenazim and Romanies. The results suggest that both groups, throughout the last millennium, have historically, and continue, to show signs of a strong connection to patterns of living established well before their appearance in Europe. Historically both groups have utilized strong purity codes and other forms of traditional law and social organization in a largely successful quest for self-determination, not in the national sense (until the recent establishment of the state of Israel), but through the creation of a parallel society insulated from the culture of the broader surrounding world. In creating and maintaining a separate space for themselves, both groups have faced the often hostile actions of outside powers, whose responses to their presence, whether in the more benign sense of granting autonomy or in the more sinister use of expulsion, exclusion, and discrimination, have had the effect of strengthening the cultural identities of Romanies and Ashkenazim. While both groups have had varying degrees of increased openness to the modern era, both also continue long-standing patterns of difference as they continue to negotiate their place in the world. While it may be easy to dismiss the medieval period as alien to our own, this study has demonstrated the continuing relevance of not only medieval, but even ancient history in continuing to affect the present in tangible and measurable ways.