Egyptian-Jewish Bohème

Abstract

In recent histories addressing the modern conceptualization of bohème, the Egyptian-origin thesis, even while known, is rarely subjected to vigorous enquiry. This is less true of histories written about the Gypsies, from which we learn that, around 1800, the thesis was rejected, and partly by being made explicit within the new sciences of the Enlightenment. Various disciplinary perspectives were engaged to prove that if the Gypsies originated in one place, then the place was not Egypt but India. But this thesis proved no less contrived than the rejected one. Chapter 11 focuses on the Egyptian-origin thesis, where the wandering of the Egyptian-Gypsies was brought into constant comparison and contrast with that of the Jews.