What are Gypsy Crafts?

Craft practices can define cultures: different skill-sets, products and patrons speak of different lifestyles. In England, gypsies are often associated with their traditional serviceable crafts and hand-skills. Many older people remember gypsies selling their  wares from baskets door-to-door; indeed, this was how many house-dwelling non-gypsies (gorgers) encountered them.

When Rupert Croft-Cooke travelled with English Romanies in the 1940s, he discussed their crafts in detail, particularly with his longest-standing companion Ted Scamp.

'Tell me some more things your people make'.

'There's hundreds', said Ted... 'There's ever s'many more things they do'.

Rupert Croft-Cooke, The Moon in my Pocket: Life with the Romanies (London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co, 1948), p. 58.

Below I have set out some traditional gypsy crafts, based on his observations:

Artificial Flowers

These were either made from cut and wired crepe paper, or wooden sticks with one end whittled into strands and dipped into coloured wax. They could last for many years.

Baskets
Although Ted thought there were still Romani basket-makers in the 1940s, he admitted he knew no one locally that 'knows the art or has the tools'. 

Beehives
Making beehives (goodlokenners) had been an important business, but, Ted supposed, had died out with the last maker, Billy 'Flood' Quitnin. Flood had used reeds and straw, but wooden box hives had since taken over.

Carpet Beaters
Ted recalled long-handled carpet beaters twisted into wonderful patterns, 'all made by our people'. A family-made beater might be hung in a wagon (vardo) for years.

Clothes Pegs 

Ted called these tograms, but didn't think this was a Romani word. He described how long sticks of even thickness were cut in the woods. Any wood that wasn't too dry, green or knotty would serve, 'But you can't be too particular. You get what you can'. The sticks were shaved and cut to length, then pieces of tin, perhaps begged by the women, were cut into strips and tapped or tacked around one end. Lastly, the other end was split - sometimes with a single cut - and mouthed, leaving it smooth for clothes. Although a skilled peg-maker could turn out around 1000 per day, it was a common skill, and labour might be divided along a workline.

Scented Wood
Ted described pieces of pine being cut into attractive shapes and soaked in lavender. With their long-lasting scent, they were bought by ladies to keep among their delicates, and fetched up to half a crown each.

Ted also referred to:

• Chair rushing (known as 'tiger-hunting')
• Coconut matting string mats
• Horn cups and spoons
• Lace-making
• Patchwork ('patchy-patchy') quilts, for the vardo bed rather than for sale

Gypsies were also renowned leatherworkers, metalworkers ('tinkering' refers to the mending of metal household utensils) and wood-carvers. I haven't mentioned wagon-carving or painting, which was a complex, collaborative venture (deserving its own post!) Skills like dress-making were, of course, widespread at the time.

Suited to travelling, these sustainable crafts relied on found, natural materials, and did not require a workshop. The results would have been welcomed by many gorgers. Industrial production and commerce have diminished these skills - like so many others - but you can still watch demonstrations.

The Moon in my Pocket

  
You are looking at one of the most prolific English writers of the twentieth century. Rupert Croft-Cooke (1903-79) may be a forgotten name, but his 125 books - encompassing fiction, poetry, plays, biography and non-fiction - stand testament to his remarkable life.

Born in Edenbridge, Kent, to Lucy and Hubert Bruce Cooke, Rupert was educated at Tonbridge School and Wellington College, and worked variously as a writer, journalist and reviewer, an antiquarian bookseller, a teacher and a radio broadcaster. In defiance of his middle-class upbringing and his father's narrowminded views, he spent many years abroad - in Paris, Buenos Aires, Morocco, Spain, Tunisia and elsewhere - living cheaply and absorbing new cultures. His autobiographical travel series, The Sensual World, brims with period detail, and whilst focussing on people and places, nevertheless reveals his honesty, optimism and social consciousness.

On my bookshelves I have a copy of Rupert's 1938 work (signed and from Foyles, no less), How to get More out of Life; a guide to maintaining individuality, surviving and even thriving in modern times. Wear a cloak, keep a pet badger, sing on the train, he advises. List all the things you want to do but think you shouldn't, and set about doing them.

Rupert practiced as he preached: in the winter of 1939, he bought a gypsy caravan (vardo) and a horse, and took to the road with a Romani companion, Ted Scamp. From Ted and many others, he learnt about Romani culture, customs, language and crafts. Despite the outbreak of war, these were blissful days.

I came to the gypsies by my own way... I lived with them because I liked it... Among the gypsies I was no lavengro, no word-man. I was too happy.

Rupert Croft-Cooke, The Moon in my Pocket: Life with the Romanies (London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co, 1948), p. 1.

To learn from books was not enough; indeed, Rupert did not discover the 'gypsiologists' - the anthropologists, historians, linguists and other successors of George Borrow, who came together under the Gypsy Lore Society - until after his own travels began.

In 1948, he recounted his experiences in The Moon in my Pocket: Life with the Romanies. (You can see pictures of this book in my first post). Ending with a powerful 'vindication' of the gypsies, his own photographs and a list of commonly-used Romani words, it educated and inspired readers. In his follow-up book of 1955, A Few Gypsies, Rupert recalls the letters he received from fans ready to take to the road themselves. But increasingly, such a way of life was no longer possible.

Impossible... to see the gypsies pass with their paint and brasswork catching the sun... without a spasm of envy. For their appointment tonight is with the rising moon, their engagement tomorrow is to meet another day.

Croft-Cooke, The Moon in my Pocket (London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co, 1948), p. 181.

I am more than grateful to Rupert Croft-Cooke. He has taught me facts I should already have known, provided wonderful insights into gypsy life and described characters so vividly that I feel I have known them. He has opened a rare window, and encouraged me to look for others.