The term Fancy Dutch or Gay Dutch refers to the Pennsylvania Germans

Pennsylvania Dutch

Pennsylvania Dutch refers to immigrants and their descendants from southwestern Germany and Switzerland who settled in Pennsylvania in the 17th and 18th centuries...

 who do not belong to the Anabaptist

Anabaptist

Anabaptists are Protestant Christians of the Radical Reformation of 16th-century Europe, and their direct descendants, particularly the Amish, Brethren, Hutterites, and Mennonites....

 churches. They, unlike the Amish

Amish

The Amish , sometimes referred to as Amish Mennonites, are a group of Christian church fellowships that form a subgroup of the Mennonite churches...

, Dunkards

Church of the Brethren

The Church of the Brethren is a Christian denomination originating from the Schwarzenau Brethren organized in 1708 by eight persons led by Alexander Mack, in Schwarzenau, Bad Berleburg, Germany. The Brethren movement began as a melding of Radical Pietist and Anabaptist ideas during the...

 and the Mennonites, who were considered sectarians, did not wear plain clothing, nor did they refuse to fight in wars. Many popularly-associated characteristics of Pennsylvania Dutch culture, including speilwerk

Pow-wow (folk magic)

Pow-wow is a system of American folk religion and magic associated with the Pennsylvania Dutch.-Origin of the name and practices:Its name comes from the book Pow-wows, or, The Long Lost Friend, written by John George Hohman and first published in German as Der Lange Verborgene Freund in 1820...

, hex sign

Hex sign

Hex signs are a form of Pennsylvania Dutch folk art, related to fraktur, found in the Fancy Dutch tradition in Pennsylvania Dutch Country. Barn paintings, usually in the form of "stars in circles," grew out of the fraktur and folk art traditions about 1850 when barns first started to be painted in...

s, and other aspects of Pennsylvania Dutch art, music, and folklore, are derived from the Fancy Dutch. The tourism industry and mainstream media often erroneously attribute such contributions to the more conservative Plain Dutch, though they would reject these worldly aspects of their more superstitious Fancy counterparts.

The Fancy Dutch far outnumbered the sectarians among the Pennsylvania Dutch. Today however, most Pennsylvania German

Pennsylvania German language

The Pennsylvania German language is a variety of West Central German possibly spoken by more than 250,000 people in North America...

 speakers are members of the plainer sects, the Fancy Dutch having been mostly assimilated into the larger culture of the United States. While the Plain Dutch regions centered around Holmes County, Ohio

Holmes County, Ohio

As of the census of 2000, there were 38,943 people, 11,337 households, and 9,194 families residing in the county. The population density was 92 people per square mile . There were 12,280 housing units at an average density of 29 per square mile...

 and Lancaster County, Pennsylvania

Lancaster County, Pennsylvania

Lancaster County, known as the Garden Spot of America or Pennsylvania Dutch Country, is a county located in the southeastern part of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, in the United States. As of 2010 the population was 519,445. Lancaster County forms the Lancaster Metropolitan Statistical Area, the...

, the Fancy Dutch lived in the countryside around Reading

Reading, Pennsylvania

Reading is a city in southeastern Pennsylvania, USA, and seat of Berks County. Reading is the principal city of the Greater Reading Area and had a population of 88,082 as of the 2010 census, making it the fifth most populated city in the state after Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown and Erie,...

, Allentown

Allentown, Pennsylvania

Allentown is a city located in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is Pennsylvania's third most populous city, after Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and the 215th largest city in the United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 118,032 and is currently...

, York

York, Pennsylvania

York, known as the White Rose City , is a city located in York County, Pennsylvania, United States which is in the South Central region of the state. The population within the city limits was 43,718 at the 2010 census, which was a 7.0% increase from the 2000 count of 40,862...

 and Lebanon

Lebanon, Pennsylvania

Lebanon, formerly known as Steitztown, is a city in and the county seat of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 25,477 at the 2010 census, a 4.2% increase from the 2000 count of 24,461...

.