Study title

The main archival source of MapRom database is the “Census of the population or Statistics of the Principalities (Wallachia and Moldova) of 1838”, ANIC, Fond Catagrafii, part I, Inventory number 501, volumes numbered I/8 to I/107 from the Historical National Archives, Bucharest, mostly unpublished and now digitized and automatized for the first time, in regard to Romani population. This Census was conducted by the Interior Ministry in February 1838. It is the first preserved Romanian modern census of population and dwellings, which introduced new techniques of reviewing, such as the nominal lists and the great number (24) of demographic variables, including ethnicity. The unit of observation was the “household”, and the scope was to obtain detailed information about: 1) the settled population by age group, and sex; 2) the number of households and their structure; 3) the number of residential buildings and their distribution according to the material from which they are built; 4) population distribution according to their participation in economic activity; 5) distribution of population by skills and occupations. Based on this information, the MapRom database presents: statistics of the Roma households per village, number of Roms per village, number of different Romani ethnic sub-groups (Lăieș, Vătraș, Rudar, Zlătar, etc), average Romani household size per village, age distribution, sex distribution, number of Roms per skill, geographic distribution of the Roms (in uplands and lowlands), cultivated land area by Roms per village, etc. We found insignificant number of free Roms, rest of them were slaves. For more than 50% of them, we have reconstructed, from other (unpublished) sources the name of the owners (private noblemen, or Monasteries and churches). We searched for other statistical documents to complete our data from 1838 Census, such as the Statistics of the Turkish Gypsies (1833, manuscript ANIC, Vornicia temnitelor, file 354/1833), Statistics of Boyar...