The Discoverie ofWitchcraft
The written history ofWestern conjuring, and consequendy close-up magic, begins with a French book, La Premi re Partie des Subtiles et Plaisantes Inventions The First Part of Subtle and Pleasant Inventions , by Jean Pr vost, published in 1584. Dr. Persi Diaconis is presendy working with a friend on an eageriy awaited English translation of this work. Pr vost's book predates Scot's The Discoverie of Witchcraft by weeks or months it is not known precisely how long, as Pr vost's book was published...
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In 1740, forty-eight years after the appearance of Ozanam's influential volume, Gilles-Edme Guyot published another French work that was to prove significant in the history of conjuring. Nouvelles R cr ations, Physiques et Math matiques New Recreations in Physics and Mathematics was modelled after Ozanam, but added many new experiments and tricks to the repertoire. Several new sleights for the Cups and Balls were explained, along with the Nest of Boxes trick, and a wealth of newly evolved card...
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In France, the development of close-up magic was enjoying a renaissance. In the first half of the nineteenth century, such renowned French magicians as Comte and Olivier published little books on conjuring. Then, in 1854, Jean Nicholas Ponsin, a professor of drawing and an amateur conjurer, wrote Nouvelle Magie Blanche D voil e New White Magic Unveiled . This was to become another classic volume on conjuring. What Decremps did to improve the technical descriptions of sleights and increase the...
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On the heels of Cremer s book, a barrister and amateur magician named Angelo Lewis began to write a serial column on conjuring for Every Boy s Magazine. Under the pen name of Professor Hoffmann, he continued this column for five years then in 1876 he compiled it into book form under the tide of Modern Magic Though Hoffmann s columns and the resulting book were seen by the conjurers of the period to be scandalous exposures, eventually Hoffmann s work came to be considered, among English-speaking...
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Gimmicked knives for penetrations from The Discoverie of Witchcraft. Gimmicked knives for penetrations from The Discoverie of Witchcraft. In 1585, one year alter the publication of The Discoverie of Witchcraft, a pamphlet tided Libretto de Secreti Noblissimi et Alcuni Giocchi con Destrezza di Mano, Cose Vere e Experimental A Book of Amazing Secrets and Some Sleight-of-hand Tricks was published in Italy for Horatio Napolitana. The booklet had only eight pages, one of which, I suspect, must have...