Roma (Gypsies) originated in the Punjab region of northern India as a nomadic people and entered Europe between the eighth and tenth centuries C.E. They were called "Gypsies" because Europeans mistakenly believed they came from Egypt. This minority is made up of distinct groups called "tribes" or "nations."
I hope it helps answered your question
Pretty sure in the UK a lot of travelers do call themselves gypsies. Depends on the group. It's not widely thought of as offensive in the UK, at least it wasn't. Maybe it is now? But we had the show my big fat gypsy wedding, and various stuff about gypsies and they called themselves it! There is a gypsy community very close to where I live but I obviously can't speak for them so I say traveler
Those are not accurate representation of Romani people and majority of the time they do use that word offensively or it’s because people are generally ignorant when it comes to Romani people and generally think that slur is what they’re called. A lot of those TV shows/reality TV shows are not what real Romani people look like at all they’re just harmful stereotypes. Specifically that show is literally just white people who gave themselves a tan. None of them were actually Romani.
They're still travlelers and gypsies in the UK, they don't call themselves Romani generally because I don't think they're that origin of traveler, hence they're white.
A small google and the travelers near me would probably be irish travelers. I don't know. I'm not super knowledgable clearly so I don't personally use the term gypsy or get involved with them. But I always just say traveler.
From my experience of them, those shows are pretty accurate to how they are near me.
Is gypsy not an offensive term for Romanian ppl or am I crazy… idk this feels a little odd