B5 Registration

With the rise of the modern nation state in the late 19th century, registration became widespread for all citizens. In the 1920s and 1930s, regional and local authorities in more and more countries began to list their local Roma and Sinti populations in special “Gypsy registers” and to issue them with special ID cards, which had to be carried at all times.

A “Gypsy ID card” (“cigányigazolvány”) complete with photograph and fingerprints issued in the Austro-Hungarian border town of Szentgotthárd in 1937.
1937