The word Roma conjures images of free-spirited nomads, creative and easy-going people who choose to eschew social conformity for personal independence and a life on the road. Few know these people’s long, tortuous history of being harassed, expelled, deported, demonized, enslaved, and murdered. The Roma is a fascinating history of this people observed from within their world that moves away from stereotypes and the tragedy that has defined them. While Madeline Potter does not overlook the deeply held racism and oppression they have endured, she instead celebrates the Roma’s strength and endurance, their ability to resist and survive. Blending memoir and archival research, her sweeping, heartfelt traveling history moves across Europe, from Tudor England to Romania where she was born and raised;from sixteenth-century Spain to modern Sweden;from Nazi Austria to twenty-first-century France to uncover the interwoven stories and struggles of Roma communities past and present, and what the fu