| Group: | Romani people in Germany |
| Population: | 170,000[1] -300,000 |
| Langs: | Sinte Romani, Romani language, Balkan Romani language, Turkish language, German |
| Rels: | Christianity, Islam |
Romani people in Germany are estimated at around 170,000[1] - 300,000,[1] constituting around 0.2-0.4% of the German population. One-third of Germany's Romani belong to the Sinti group.[2] Most speak German or Sinte Romani.
The Romani people originate from the Northern India,[3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] presumably from the northwestern Indian states Rajasthan[7] [8] and Punjab.[7] Linguistic studies have argued that roots of Romani languages lie in India: the languages have grammatical characteristics of Indian languages and share with them a part of the basic lexicon, for example, body parts or daily routines. More exactly, Romani shares the basic lexicon with Hindi and Punjabi. It shares many phonetic features with Marwari, while its grammar is closest to Bengali.[9]
Genetic findings in 2012 suggest the Romani originated in northwestern India and migrated as a group.[10] According to a genetic study in 2012 about the ancestors of present scheduled tribes and scheduled caste populations of northern India, traditionally referred to collectively as the Ḍoma, are the likely ancestral populations of modern European Roma.
In February 2016, during the International Roma Conference, the Indian Minister of External Affairs stated that the people of the Roma community were children of India. The conference ended with a recommendation to the Government of India to recognize the Roma community spread across 30 countries as a part of the Indian diaspora.[11]
There are different groups of Romani people in Germany. The first record in Hildesheim dates from 1407, and in Silesia, they were already present in 1401. These are the Secanos, who migrated to the Polish-Lithuanian kingdom in several waves from the 15th to the 17th century. They later made up the Polska Roma in Poland, and thus the Baltic Roma and Ruska Roma (Heladytka (Soldaten) Roma) also emerged. There are also Sinti in Germany who have been present in Germany for a very long time. But it cannot be confirmed by the name Sinti how long this Roma Group group has been in Germany, as the name Sinti only appeared in the 18th century.
There are different Christian Roma groups like the Lalleri, Kalderash, Čurara, Boyash, Wallachian Roma, Gitanos, and Muslim Roma/Xoraxane like Arlije, Gurbeti, Romanlar in Turkey. Some People of Roma ethnicity came as Gastarbeiter to Germany from countries such as Turkey, former Yugoslavia, Greece, Spain and Italy. Especially Turkish speaking Xoraxane-Roma from Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey, declaread themselves as Turks only and are viewed as Turks by Germans. Since the Kosovo War in 1998-1999, Romani people in Kosovo, Ashkali and Balkan Egyptians also came to Germany.[12]
‘While a nine century removal from India has diluted Indian biological connection to the extent that for some Romani groups, it may be hardly representative today, Sarren (1976:72) concluded that we still remain together, genetically, Asian rather than European’
.