Eternal Vagrants? State Formation, Migration and Travelling Groups in Western Eurone, 1350–1914

Abstract

In this chapter we will try to give an explanation why European societies, especially the authorities, pursued such a repressive policy towards travelling groups, whom they labelled as ‘Gypsies’ or ‘vagrants’ from the Middle Ages onwards, and how the stigmatization of these groups has been fixed. The assumption that the attitude of the authorities and the state towards migration in general and itinerant groups in particular is pivotal in explaining the co-existence of a strong and ongoing stigmatization of these groups as social misfits and their simultaneous functional economic role is not enough. State formation alone does not do the trick. In order to avoid a circular argument and in order to gain a clear insight into the interaction between the authorities and travelling groups, we also have to consider the function of migration for the labour market. The main reason for this is that the nucleus of the accusation is economic: the travellers were working under the cloak of begging and stealing or refusing to work. If we want to understand the stigmatization, we therefore have to link the ideas on travelling groups to the structural economic developments from the Middle Ages onwards.