The Yéniches are a seminomad ethnicity of Europe whose origin is not known. They have their own language, the Langue yéniche whose certain elements give an indication on their own history which is lengthily enracinée in Europe. Yéniches are distinguished physically from the majority of the Rrom S by their European type (clear hair, blue eyes or greens…), which is worth often the nickname of " to them; Gypsies blancs". One finds them mainly in Germany (area of the Rhine), Switzerland, Austria, France and Belgium.

They are often compared to Roms, because of their wandering (formerly generalized but today partial), marginalized life and exerting the same trades (grinder, basket maker, scrap merchant). The majority of Yéniches refuse to be regarded as Rrom S. persecutions and the racism whose Rroms were and are still victims, in particular in Germany, weigh certainly in this refusal.

Localization and number

Approximately 200.000 Yéniches live in Germany, including 120.000 in Bavaria, the Rhineland of North-Westphalia and Bade-Wurtemberg. The majority of Yéniches of Germany are with half or completely sedentaries; 29.000 are nomads, i.e. they live and travel all the year in caravans. In Suisse there are 50.000 Yéniches, including 3.500 nomads. In Austria live 35.000 especially Yéniches with the the Tyrol, in the Mühlviertel, the Waldviertel and in the Burgenland and of which approximately 3.500 are wandering permanent. In Hungary live 60.000 Yéniches and in Bielorussia 11.000, of which an unspecified number of nomads. In Belgium one counted, in the years 1990,7 000 Yéniches itinerants, the number of sedentaries not being known. With the Luxembourg, they would be some 2800. In the other countries of Western Europe where are present of Yéniches, like the France and the Netherlands one does not know the number of it. Alain Reyniers wrote in an article of the review Études Tziganes (N°2/91): Yéniches constitute today in France, undoubtedly the most important group (among the nomads) .

Their peregrinations can carry out them until in Serbia or Estonia. Only Switzerland recognizes them like a national minority.

Origin

Yéniches often describe themselves as descendants of the Celtes. The arguments on this subject however are scientifically as disputed as different the other theses and myths on the birth from the people yéniche. The case of Yéniches illustrates the difficulty of precisely determining the origins of these marginalized populations, where the mixed unions were and remain frequent.

The thesis according to which Yéniches would come from groups of Jewish tradesmen itinerant (Chochemer), is based on the hébraïsmes of the language yéniche and on the existence of considerable similarities in family names of the two communities. This thesis neglects however the first certificates of the word yéniche and the oldest branch of the language yéniche. If Yéniches resulted only from itinerant Jewish tradesmen, one cannot explain the reason for which essential parts of their language Yiddish would have been replaced to some extent by old foreign languages.

More probable is the assumption according to which intercultural marriages introduced Jewish names into the community yéniche. According to another theory, Yéniches would result from mixtures, at the time of the disorders of the Guerre Thirty Year old between impoverished deserters and a group of Swiss emigrants during the Guerre of the German peasants (1520 to 1525).

History

Yéniches were always perceived according to the spirit of the time of the dominant company. Three characteristics remain whatever the time:

1. a autonomous Idiom , the language yéniche which certainly, like any language, evolved/moved during the centuries but whose heart and nature remained the same ones. Documents go back to the year 1250.
2. an organization as family clans.
3. a wandering life.

The Middle Ages at the 20th century

The 20th century

Since second half 19th century, inter alia because of the sedentarisation described above, the travellers were also numerous only with the Moyen-âge.

Although they were socially regarded by the Communistes as part of the nonintegrable Sous-prolétariat in the company, they found in the years 1920 in the writings of the Anarchistes (such as for example Erich Müsham) and of the Non-conformistes a historical recognition as a “example living of an autonomous and nonconventional against-company” .

German Reich and period Nazi

Although during the Nazism, the publications of the Office of health of Reich and the writings of the theorists of racism Robert Ritter and Eva Justin do not connect Yéniches with the Rroms, Yéniches are regarded by the Nazis as asocial, are off-set in the concentration camps and are often massacred.

Yéniches known

Them Marx Brothers: celebrate comic American, their father was at the same time Yiddish and yéniche born in Alsace.

- Stephan Eicher: celebrate Suisse singer, of father yéniche and Alsatian mother.

- Rafael Van der Vaart: one of best the Dutch footballer of his generation, father yéniche and Spanish mother.

- Johnny Leoni: goalkeeper of the football club champion of Switzerland, the FC Zurich.

- Mariella Mehr: Swiss writer.

- Uschi Waser: Swiss writer and president of association " Naschet, Jenische " (Rises, Jenische).

- Franzli Waser: Swiss musician.

- HölzerLips: group Yéniche-German having recorded songs in language yéniche in 1978.

- Sebastien Heitzmann: French footballer evolving/moving at the station of attacker, currently playing for the Picardy ones of the SC Amiens.

- Julien Lorcy: World champion of boxing WBA, yéniche originating in the north of France.

- Christophe Dettinger: Resulting from the one of the more big family Yéniche de France present in the Rhone-Alps and Paris region, he is champion of France of boxing of supers-heavy since October 30th, 2007.

External bonds

• Yeniches in Europe
• religious Organization yéniche in Austria
• Festival of Yéniches 2004 (in Germany)
• Union of Yéniches (in Germany)
• Organization of the '' travelling entertainers '' in Switzerland)
• Schinagel Union (Swiss)
• Naschet Jenische, the organization of the '' Hilfswerk Kinder der Landstrasse '' - Opfer (Am)
• schäft qwant - transnational Union for collaboration yéniche and the cultural exchange

• the auteure Mariella Mehr

• the historian Thomas Huonker, Yénisches, Sinti, Roms
• Festival of the Secondhand trade

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