Beni Addas: the outcast Roma of Algeria
“Bani Addas” or “Adaysiya” are words that Algerians inherited from their mothers and grandmothers to describe morally degraded people, but few of them understand the origin of these names. O God, there are a very small number of specialists, including historians, students of historical research institutes, and specialists in genealogy.
In fact, the origin of these words goes back to a group of people with whom Algerians coexist cautiously, but they are ignorant of their history and origins. Some Algerians call them “Bani Adas” and “Bani Hagras,” while others call them “Gitano” or “Jawatna,” which means gypsies.
The names may differ from one region to another, but these people all share one and unified way of living, which is constant travel, and they also share one feature, which is that if they settle in a land, they wreak havoc on it.
Despite the abundance of money they have to raise livestock, including sheep, sheep, goats, and camels, you find them preferring tents and mobile carts pulled by mules, which these people usually use as temporary shelters that respond to the details of a life of loitering under the stars in the sky, away from the safety of concrete walls.
With distinctive clothing that differs from the rest of the citizens and tattoo marks distributed throughout the body, their women are known as “Qazanat,” which means beggars and witches. They pretend to be poor to seek the sympathy of passers-by by wearing shabby clothes with dirt covering their facial features.
"The mentality of Bani Adas"
“Stop down, Zarqa, and the Banu Adas will ride you.” This is another proverb that is often repeated on the tongues of the people of eastern Algeria, and it refers to an expensive thing when it becomes cheap and becomes accessible to the masses of people.
The truth is that this proverb is linked to a historical incident dating back to the first days of the entry of French colonialism into Algeria, where it was met with fierce resistance from the indigenous Algerian tribes that lasted for decades, during which the Algerian people paid everything dear and precious. France did not find anyone to support it and support it in this resistant land except the Beni tribes. Addas.
They are a gypsy people whose men live on theft and fraud and their women on palm reading and (other things)... So France dressed them in brocades and turbans, rode them on purebred horses, and unleashed them on the country and its people to wreak havoc and make its honorable people humiliated.
According to the incident recorded by historians, one of the free citizens looked at one of these mobs as he was passing by in full finery, strutting on a blue mare, and said, addressing the mare that he was proud to ride on the scum of the people: “Slow down, you blue people, and they will ride you, Bani Adas.” His saying this became an example that is frequently repeated on the tongues of creation.
France left and became a thing of the past, but the Bani Addas mentality was inherited by its people.
To this day, the expression “Bani Adas” has been and continues to be loaded with various immoral connotations that come in the form of insulting the person who is intended to be insulted. It is an insult that is usually used to describe those with low morals and the vice groups in society. It is not surprising to hear a mother calling one of her children for refusing to obey her orders or Her directives, or he showed disgraceful behavior, by saying to him, “Go, Bani Adaas,” or “Go, O Ladaysi.” Other mothers do the same thing with their daughters when one of them makes a mistake or makes a mistake, so she goes and says to her, “You Adaysia,” and all the usages refer to a lack of education and modesty.
Roma origin of Algeria
The Roma peoples are basically divided into the Romans in Europe and the Cowlis and Domers in the Middle East. Some of them speak a common language that may be of Indian origin, and some of them have similar culture and traditions. Until the late twentieth century, the Roma peoples continued to live a life of movement and travel.
There are different opinions regarding the history of the Roma and their origins, including that these people were originally from the peoples of India, Iran, and the regions of Central and South Asia. They migrated from their lands around the fourth century AD, and some historians explained that they were in the middle of the fifteenth century (approximately 1440 AD). They reached the regions of Hungary, Serbia, and the rest of the other Balkan countries, then after that they spread to Poland and then Spain, and their spread continued until they reached Algeria in large numbers. The Roma of Algeria belong to the Romans, and they spoke the Romanian language and later converted to Islam.
Among the most famous Roma tribes known in Algeria are the Beni Hagras, Beni Addas, and Omarion in the Hassi region on the outskirts of Setif, and other regions in states from the east and west, such as the state of Relizane, Tiaret, Saida, and even southern Algeria.
Source: websites