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Herodotus' Sigynnai (5.9) and Gipsies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2009

D. S. Barrett
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Extract

For well over 150 years commentators on Herodotus have raised the possibility of a connection between the Sigynnai and gipsies, sometimes on their own account, sometimes by reference to others. The latest is B. Virgilio, who cites Ph.-E. Legrand, who argues that the Sigynnai lived in what is now Hungary, and that their name is therefore linked with cigany, the Hungarian word for ‘gipsy’ (in German, Zigeuner). H. Verdin states that they are ‘sometimes' identified with gipsies, but warns that K. von Fritz regards the matter as very uncertain. F. H. Weissbach refers almost wearily to the prevalence of the theory;s R. W. Macan6 ascribes it to J. W. Blakesley; E. Abbot refers to it fleetingly; P. Bataillard propounded it in a series of studies between 1844 and 1885.

Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , April 1979 , pp. 58 - 60
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1979

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References

Notes

1. Adloc, 1975.

2. Ad loc, 1946.

3. De historiscb-kritische methode van Herodotus (Brussels, 1971), p. 146 n. 3Google Scholar.

4. Die griechische Geschichtsscbreibung, i, Von den Anfängen bis Tbukydides Anmerkungen (Berlin, 1967), 163 n. 235Google Scholar.

5. PW IIA. 2 (1923), 2458Google Scholar, citing Hasse, , Die Zigeuner im Herodot (Konigsburg, 1803)Google Scholar, which I have not been able to sight.

6. Ad loc, 1895.

7. Ad loc, 1854.

8. Ad loc, 1893.

9. EB 11 (London, 1910–11), vol. 12, pp. 37–43Google Scholar, s.v. ‘Gipsies’–a masterly study with extensive bibliography, in an edition which is still a byword among reference librarians.

10. Anthropological Essays Presented to Edward Burnett Tylor in Honour of his 75tb Birthday (Oxford, 1907), pp. 255–76Google Scholar.

11. G. Rawlinson's explanation of ἒρημος χώρη is undoubtedly correct: ‘Hungary and Austria seem to be the countries intended in this description. Dense forests and vast morasses would in the early times have rendered them scarcely habitable.’

12. See photograph in Erdei, F. (ed.), Information Hungary (Oxford, 1968), p. 128Google Scholar.

13. Reich, E. in EB 11 (op. cit.), vol. 13, p. 898Google Scholar, s.v. ‘Hungary’.

14. Herodotus (Berkeley, 1924), p. 180Google Scholar.