THE SACRED AND PROFANE (M.

ELIADE): The work presents information concerning the concepts of the sacred and profane and it consists of 4 chapters: the sacred space, sacred time, sacred nature, and sacred self. In these chapters, an analysis is given between the homo religious (sacred, traditional) and the non-religious, modern man (profane), and shows how modern people, although secularized, still experience sometimes a sense of the sacred. For example, the non-religious man experiences the space of world neutrally, while the sacred man experiences the world as having a sacred center where he used to live. For the modern man, only locations such as his birth place are experienced as special. Eliade shows how the sacred is manifested in the profane world, by introducing the concept of hierophany. For example: church as a sacred place- whose doors represents the gap between the profane on the outside, and the sacred on the inside. Just as in Eliades La tiganci for the travelers in the train, the place of the gypsies is regarded as a degrading, mysterious, and shameful place, while for Gavrilescu it represents his escape from the modern, profane world, entering the sacred realm, free of the contingencies of time and space.

It is not possible to apply Eliades whole theory to his fantastic novel La tiganci, but it is indeed helpful in interpreting the story. Why? Because La tiganci presents precisely the manifestation of the sacred in the profane (hierophany), illustrating death as an event.

Thus, in this essay, I want to illustrate how the spiritual passage from life to death is presented in the fantastic novel La tiganci through the manifestation of the sacred in the profane realm/ the concept of hierophany.