With the Dale Farm eviction set to take place today, Gypsy life and culture is again in the spotlight, but this BBC Kent article takes a look at Gyspy language contributions to English, contributions that go back a long way and are quite deeply embedded in our common language.
A couple of these - mush and cushti - were just normal English slang as far as I was concerned growing up in Wiltshire in the 1980s and it didn't really cross my mind that it was Gypsy dialect/slang until much later.
This page from the BBC Voices site gives a bit more detail about the roots of Romany/Gyspsy/traveller dialects while this 1897 Dictionary of Slang, Jargon and Cant features some great examples from Gypsy and other non-standard varieties.
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