The Parrajmos (the great devouring), the holocaust of the Romani people, the Gypsies, was rooted in hatreds that preceded the Second World War. For hundreds of years harsh measures had been taken against Gypsies in Europe. In Germany they were hunted for sport as animals, and huntsmen would return proudly displaying the severed heads that they had taken as souvenirs. Beginning in 1890 many European countries passed a variety of laws restricting “the Gypsy filth”, placing limits on their interactions with the general population and prohibiting them from engaging in trades or owning land.

Upon coming to power the Nazis reinstituted anti-Gypsy laws that had been on the books since the Middle Ages. But with their racist ideology they soon moved beyond those statutes. The Nazis established the Racial Hygiene and Criminal Biology Research Unit. This institution concluded that Gypsies were sub-humans.

On June 11, 1941, three hundred teenage Gypsy boys were sent to a camp in Austria were they were used to test the effectiveness of the gas chambers. None survived

More then 3000 Gypsy prisoners died in French camps from disease and starvation, and almost 13.000 were sent just from Drancy in France to death camps such as Auschwitz where they were gassed upon arrival. Other transit camps in France from which Gypsies were sent to their deaths included Noe, Gurs, Recebedou, and others.

It is estimated that by the end of the war the Nazis and their minions had murdered seventy to eighty per cent of the Gypsy population of Europe. Approximately 675,000 of these deaths were registered, but many more went unrecorded.

At the Nuremberg trials no representatives of the Gypsies were called to bear witness. No war crimes reparations have been paid to the Roma as a people.







"Tambourine" is recomended for all educaters in Europe for their students.



















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From "Tambourine" By Nily Naiman