![]() ![]() Some fairy tales of medieval Europe have beggars cast curses on anyone who was insulting or stingy toward them. ![]() Gyrovagues were itinerant monks of the upper Middle-Age. Others show them as subversives, or outlaws, who make a parasitical living through theft, fear and threat. ![]() Some ancient sources show vagrants as passive objects of pity, who deserve generosity and the gift of alms. ![]() Vagrants have been historically characterised as outsiders in settled, ordered communities: embodiments of otherness, objects of scorn or mistrust, or worthy recipients of help and charity. In Middle English, vagabond originally denoted a person without a home or employment. The term vagabond is derived from Latin vagabundus. Historically, vagrancy in Western societies was associated with petty crime, begging and lawlessness, and punishable by law with forced labor, military service, imprisonment, or confinement to dedicated labor houses.īoth vagrant and vagabond ultimately derive from the Latin word vagari, meaning "to wander". Vagrants (also known as bums, vagabonds, rogues, drag-worms, drag-rats, tramps or drifters) usually live in poverty and support themselves by begging, scavenging, petty theft, temporary work, or social security (where available). Vagrancy is the condition of homelessness without regular employment or income. ![]()
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