his sister Guin. The chief accepted the advice,
the wheel turned round, and the name of the tribe after this incident
became that of the combined names of the brother and sister,
Chenguin, the appellation of all the Gipsies of Turkey at the present
day.' The legend goes on to state that, in consequence of this
unnatural marriage, the Gipsies were cursed and condemned by a
Mohammedan saint to wander for ever on the face of the earth. The
real meaning of the myth--for myth it is--is very apparent. Chen is
a Romany word, generally pronounced Chone, meaning the moon, while
Guin is almost universally rendered _Gan_ or _Kan_. _Kan_ is given
by George Borrow as meaning sun, and we have ourselves heard English
Gipsies call it _kan_, although _kam_ is usually assumed to be right.
Chen-kan means, therefore, moon-sun. And it may be remarked in this
connection that the Roumanian Gipsies have a wild legend stating that
the sun was a youth who, having fallen in love with his own sister,
was condemned as the sun to wander for ever in pursuit of her turned
into the moon. A similar legend exists in Greenland and the island
of Borneo, and it was known to the old Irish. It was very natural
that the Gipsies, observing that the sun and moon were always
apparently wandering, should have identified their own nomadic life
with that of these luminaries. It may be objected by those to whom
the term 'solar myth' is as a red rag that this story, to prove
anything, must first be proved itself. This will probably not be far
to seek. If it can be found among any of the wanderers in India, it
may well be accepted, until something better turns up, as the
possible origin of the greatly disputed Zingan. It is quite as
plausible as Dr. Mikliosch's derivation from the Acingani--[Greek
text]--'an unclean, heretical Christian sect, who dwelt in Phrygia
and Lycaonia from the seventh till the eleventh century.' The
mention of Mekran indicates clearly that the moon-sun story came from
India before the Romany could have obtained any Greek name. And if
the Romany call themselves Jengan, or Chenkan, or Zin-gan, in the
East, it is extremely unlikely that they ever received such a name
from the Gorgios in Europe."

Professor Bott, in his "Die Zigeuner in Europa und Asien," speaks of the
Gipsies or _Lury_ as follows:--"In t