The Language of Thieves: My Family's Obsession with a Secret Code the Nazis Tried to Eliminate

Tracking an underground language and the outcasts who depended on it for their survival.

Centuries ago in middle Europe, a coded language appeared, scrawled in graffiti and spoken only by people who were "wiz" (in the know). This hybrid language, dubbed Rotwelsch, facilitated survival for people in flight—whether escaping persecution or just down on their luck. It was a language of the road associated with vagabonds, travelers, Jews, and thieves that blended words from Yiddish, Hebrew, Germa...