Romani language
Romani (; also Romany; ) is any of several languages of the Romani people belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family. According to Ethnologue, seven varieties of Romani are divergent enough to be considered languages of their own. The largest of these are Vlax Romani (about 500,000 speakers), Balkan Romani (600,000), and Sinte Romani (300,000). Some Romani communities speak mixed languages based on the surrounding language with retained Romani-derived vocabulary – these are known by linguists as Para-Romani varieties, rather than dialects of the Romani language itself.
Romani people in Bulgaria
The Romani people emigrated from Northern India, presumably from the northwestern Indian states of Rajasthan and Punjab, possibly as early as 600 A.D. They emigrated to the Middle East and then reached the European continent. Moreover, "the Roma (the name is the plural form of the word “Rom”) moved from India at the beginning of the 12th century, reached Europe in the 14th century and Central Europe in the 15th century." The language of the Romani people is called Romani [romaňi čhib] or Romany. It is an Indic (or Indo-Aryan) language — like Sanskrit, Hindi, and Bengali — which belongs to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European family. The language retains much of the Indic morphology, phonology and lexicon, while its syntax has been heavily influenced by contact with other languages.