Cagots

Cagots (Basque Agotac), a name given to a distinct tribe of people, who are found scattered in the district of the western Pyrenees. Formerly they were usually said to be the descendants of the Visigoths, who remained in France after their defeat by Clovis in the 5th century, and the name was explained as a corruption of canis gothus ('Gothic dog'). But it is difficult to understand why such a descent should have maintained its opprobrium. Others have connected them with the Albigenes, or the Moors left behind in Gascony after the disaster at Tours; it is far more likely that they were originally the victims of social seclusion due to the 'taint of leprosy, but that the disease wore itself out from their healthy way of life. M. de Rochas has strengthened this argument by showing how easily Caqueux, the ordinary name applied to the same or a similar people in Brittany, is formed from the Celto-Breton word cacodd, 'leprosy.' Until the French Revolution they were forced to wear a peculiar dress, were forbidden to practise all but the most menial trades, though M. P. Raymond has shown that in the 14th and 15th centuries some were even bankers and physicians, and were obliged to live isolated, either in separate villages or in separate quarters of the towns. So complete was their estrangement from the other inhabitants, that they were forced to enter the churches by doors specially set apart for them. Since that Revolution, they have been placed, as regards the law, on an equal footing with other citizens, but socially they are still regarded as a degraded race. In their language there is nothing that is distinctive, save that their isolation has sometimes made them speak a purer dialect than their neighbours, nor yet are they ethnologically distinct; although many have claimed that the predominant blue eyes, fair hair, and fair complexion point back to a Teutonic origin. They have been often connected erroneously with the Cretins, with whom their healthy frames, and strong but not unhandsome figures, have little in common. Races, whose history and present condition greatly resemble those of the Cagots of south-western France, are called Caqueux in Brittany, and Colliberts in Poitou, Maine, and Anjou. See Michel, Histoire des Races Maudites de la France et de l'Espagne (2 vols. 1847); the bulletins of the Société Anthropologique (1871, &c.); Rochas, Les Parias de France et d'Espagne, Cagots et Bohémians (1877); and Dr J. Hack Tuke in vol. ix. (1880) of the Journal of the Anthropological Institute.