map of Andalusia from a 1635 Elsevier edition of Caesar
’s Commentaries
(first written ca. 50 BCE )
,
the book
Carmen’s
narrator carries at the beginning of the story
.
An Encounter with Gypsies
Barcelona, 1845
I have reached the goal of my long journey and have been admirably received by my archivist, who had already prepared my tables and the ancient books in which I shall lose what remains of my sight. To find his
despacho
, a gothic hall of the fourteenth century must be traversed, and a marble court planted with orange-trees as tall as our lime-trees, and covered with ripe fruit. This is very poetical, and as regards comfort and luxury recalls, as does my chamber, the Asiatic caravanserai. However, it is better than Andalusia though the natives are inferior and have a fatal defect in my eyes, or rather ears, in that I understand nothing of their gibberish. At Perpignan, I met two gypsies who were cropping mules, and I spoke
caló
to them to the great horror of my companion, a colonel of artillery; while they, finding me even more skilled than themselves in the
patois
, offered a striking testimony to my attainments of which I was not a little proud. In summing up the results of my journey, my conviction is that it was unnecessary to come so far, and that my history could have been satisfactorily accomplished without disturbing the venerable dust of Aragonese archives.
—
From one of Mérimée’s letters to Jeanne Françoise Dacquin. Mérimée wrote
Carmen
in 1845 while in the midst of researching a history ofDon Pedro, the notoriously cruel king of Castile and León who reigned from 1350 to 1369. Like the narrator of
Carmen, Mérimée
was an antiquarian, at first in an amateur capacity. Then, in 1834, Mérimée was appointed Inspector General of Historical Monuments for France, and for the next eighteen years he spent most of his summers traveling to small towns throughout the country to study churches, chateaux, and artwork as part of an enormous project to catalog and preserve France’s cultural heritage, the first sustained attempt to do so
.
2. THE INFLUENCE OF GEORGE BORROW
Borrow in the Novella
M. Borrow, an English missionary, the author of two very interesting works on the gypsies of Spain, whom he had undertaken to convert at the expense of the Bible Society, asserts that there is no known instance of a
gitana
having a weakness for a man not of her race.
—
From the last chapter of
Carmen.
On Gypsy Dialect
Saint Cloud, August 1866
You asked me whence I derived my knowledge of the gypsy dialect: from M. Borrow whose book is one of the most curious that I ever read. What he relates of the gypsies is perfectly true, and his personal observations agree perfectly with my own, except on one point. In his character of clergyman he was naturally deceived in matters respecting which I, as a Frenchman and
laic
, have a clearer insight from personal experience. It is exceedingly singular, however, that this man gifted in languages to the extent of speaking the Cali dialect, should possess so little grammatical perspicacity as not to see at a glance that many words unknown in Spanish have remained in this dialect. He asserts that only the roots of Sanskrit words have been preserved.
—
From one of Mérimée’s letters to Jeanne Françoise Dacquin. George Borrow , an agent of the British Bible Society, wrote a number of popular books about Gypsies, and it was Borrow’s translation of the Gospel of Luke into
caló
(published in 1837 and referenced in Mérimée’s letter to the Countess Montijo , above) that reawakened Mérimée’s interest in Spanish Gypsies in the early 1840s . Borrow’s books were part of a small flood of scholarly publications on Gypsies during the period, allowing concrete information to replace, somewhat, Romantic imaginings
.
An Authoritative Work on Gypsies
Preface
It is with some diffidence that the author ventures to offer the present work to the public.
The greater part of
’s Commentaries
(first written ca. 50 BCE )
,
the book
Carmen’s
narrator carries at the beginning of the story
.
An Encounter with Gypsies
Barcelona, 1845
I have reached the goal of my long journey and have been admirably received by my archivist, who had already prepared my tables and the ancient books in which I shall lose what remains of my sight. To find his
despacho
, a gothic hall of the fourteenth century must be traversed, and a marble court planted with orange-trees as tall as our lime-trees, and covered with ripe fruit. This is very poetical, and as regards comfort and luxury recalls, as does my chamber, the Asiatic caravanserai. However, it is better than Andalusia though the natives are inferior and have a fatal defect in my eyes, or rather ears, in that I understand nothing of their gibberish. At Perpignan, I met two gypsies who were cropping mules, and I spoke
caló
to them to the great horror of my companion, a colonel of artillery; while they, finding me even more skilled than themselves in the
patois
, offered a striking testimony to my attainments of which I was not a little proud. In summing up the results of my journey, my conviction is that it was unnecessary to come so far, and that my history could have been satisfactorily accomplished without disturbing the venerable dust of Aragonese archives.
—
From one of Mérimée’s letters to Jeanne Françoise Dacquin. Mérimée wrote
Carmen
in 1845 while in the midst of researching a history ofDon Pedro, the notoriously cruel king of Castile and León who reigned from 1350 to 1369. Like the narrator of
Carmen, Mérimée
was an antiquarian, at first in an amateur capacity. Then, in 1834, Mérimée was appointed Inspector General of Historical Monuments for France, and for the next eighteen years he spent most of his summers traveling to small towns throughout the country to study churches, chateaux, and artwork as part of an enormous project to catalog and preserve France’s cultural heritage, the first sustained attempt to do so
.
2. THE INFLUENCE OF GEORGE BORROW
Borrow in the Novella
M. Borrow, an English missionary, the author of two very interesting works on the gypsies of Spain, whom he had undertaken to convert at the expense of the Bible Society, asserts that there is no known instance of a
gitana
having a weakness for a man not of her race.
—
From the last chapter of
Carmen.
On Gypsy Dialect
Saint Cloud, August 1866
You asked me whence I derived my knowledge of the gypsy dialect: from M. Borrow whose book is one of the most curious that I ever read. What he relates of the gypsies is perfectly true, and his personal observations agree perfectly with my own, except on one point. In his character of clergyman he was naturally deceived in matters respecting which I, as a Frenchman and
laic
, have a clearer insight from personal experience. It is exceedingly singular, however, that this man gifted in languages to the extent of speaking the Cali dialect, should possess so little grammatical perspicacity as not to see at a glance that many words unknown in Spanish have remained in this dialect. He asserts that only the roots of Sanskrit words have been preserved.
—
From one of Mérimée’s letters to Jeanne Françoise Dacquin. George Borrow , an agent of the British Bible Society, wrote a number of popular books about Gypsies, and it was Borrow’s translation of the Gospel of Luke into
caló
(published in 1837 and referenced in Mérimée’s letter to the Countess Montijo , above) that reawakened Mérimée’s interest in Spanish Gypsies in the early 1840s . Borrow’s books were part of a small flood of scholarly publications on Gypsies during the period, allowing concrete information to replace, somewhat, Romantic imaginings
.
An Authoritative Work on Gypsies
Preface
It is with some diffidence that the author ventures to offer the present work to the public.
The greater part of
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