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...