Conclusions

Abstract

This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license. ConclusionsThis study evolved out of a research project that investigated census-like population registers completed in Wallachia in 1838, now in the Romanian national archives. These lists were very detailed and gave the names and ages of all household members and proceeded to indicate both their "nationality", that is to say ethnicity and their main occupation. The registers also included economic data such as the amount of land cultivated and the crops grown, as well as how many horses, oxen, sheep, goats and pigs were kept, if there were beehives, the size of orchards, what fruit trees were tended and how large were the vineyards, etc. The lists were made for each village by local officials. A few of the lists are missing, but the archived material covers most of Wallachia. An article based on the analysis of more than 12,000 households classified as Țigan has been published concerning the living conditions of "Gypsy" slaves (Gaunt and Rotaru 2021).Studying the preserved registers revealed 800 households classified as rudar. Because the modern Rudari have been the object of much research and speculation, we decided to undertake this separate study on these households to see if the register could cast further light on the development of this group. There are many reasons why the Rudari have attracted researchers. Although considered by their neighbours as marginalized outsiders, mainly because of their lifestyle, which has meant they have been constantly treated as part of the Romani or Gypsy ethnic community, most Rudari reject the Romani identity and for this they give many reasons. Particularly, those Rudari interviewed in Romania by linguists and ethnographers during the twentieth century, do not speak Romani čhib but rather an archaic variety of the Romanian language. Also, the very name Rudar is an older Slavic term for miner, even though at present they work mostly with wood. Hence, it is possible to interpret them as a case of the fluidity of socio-professional identities coupled with flexible ethnic identity. Our research expanded in order to gain increased knowledge about this group: when and where did the Rudari change from extracting precious metals along Wallachia's sub-Carpathian rivers into carving wood throughout the Balkan countries? How did this community maintain self-identification as Rudar despite no longer prospecting for gold? When, where and indeed did they ever begin to distance themselves from the Romani community? When did they begin to migrate out of Wallachia?Ethnologists, folklorists, linguists, and social anthropologists have dominated studies of modern Rudari and they describe various aspects of groups of wood-carving people who have cultural traits that mix elements taken from