Laws affecting 19th century European Romani
Setting: 1830-1870 Central Europe (France, Germany, Austria, and Bohemia mostly)
Google Search: "Romani in 19th century Europe", "19th century laws relating to Romani, "19th century romani regulation", "19th century romani persecution"
Same search terms used with 'gypsy' and 'Roma' to see if anything different came up (and because I'm not entirely sure which term is the most appropriate/commonly used).
One of my PoV characters is a man of Romani (specifically Sinti) descent who wound up in the care of the Catholic Church when he was very young. They kept him around effectively as slave labour until someone higher up decides to put him to a different use by making him a secret agent in their super secret supernatural evil fighting order. What I'm basically having trouble with is working out how much trouble his Romani heritage would get him in when he starts getting sent out and about on the business of this order. I've found a variety of laws regarding the treatment of Romani in the relevant parts of Europe for various different time periods, but none of them are particularly good matches for the period I want. The best I've found is vague mentions that some of the harsher laws were relaxed towards the end of the 19th century, but nothing about which ones those were or how far they were relaxed. I'm also trying to find out how the wider Catholic Church might react to him. I have found a few things there, but the messages have been very mixed (some saying giving alms to the Romani is a greater sin than theft and refusing to bury them or baptise their children even if they claimed to be Catholic, others implying all was fine so long as they would convert).
Any light shed on the subject would be appreciated.
Google Search: "Romani in 19th century Europe", "19th century laws relating to Romani, "19th century romani regulation", "19th century romani persecution"
Same search terms used with 'gypsy' and 'Roma' to see if anything different came up (and because I'm not entirely sure which term is the most appropriate/commonly used).
One of my PoV characters is a man of Romani (specifically Sinti) descent who wound up in the care of the Catholic Church when he was very young. They kept him around effectively as slave labour until someone higher up decides to put him to a different use by making him a secret agent in their super secret supernatural evil fighting order. What I'm basically having trouble with is working out how much trouble his Romani heritage would get him in when he starts getting sent out and about on the business of this order. I've found a variety of laws regarding the treatment of Romani in the relevant parts of Europe for various different time periods, but none of them are particularly good matches for the period I want. The best I've found is vague mentions that some of the harsher laws were relaxed towards the end of the 19th century, but nothing about which ones those were or how far they were relaxed. I'm also trying to find out how the wider Catholic Church might react to him. I have found a few things there, but the messages have been very mixed (some saying giving alms to the Romani is a greater sin than theft and refusing to bury them or baptise their children even if they claimed to be Catholic, others implying all was fine so long as they would convert).
Any light shed on the subject would be appreciated.