Well in Ponsin, there is a suggestion that the first servantes were dating back to the beginning of the XIXth century when the performer would simply pin up the inner falling corners of the table cloth, creating a sort of long pouch in teh rear of the table. It seems that Conus would have been the first to do this as he is the first performer to have done a routine with copper balls detailed in Ponsin and in Robert Houdin but following a totally different path from Paul Gertner (and if I can admit it my own routine that Bill knows).

This makes sense since the C&Bs players had left the "fairs" grounds to get into the salons where a gibecière would have been inappropriate (the gibecière was a game bag) Thus it is unlikely that the performers of that time were as smart as our Bill Palmer to consider the table's height, but on some engravings of the XIXth century, it can be seen that the tables are already fairly high and sometimes the represented moves bring the hands fairly high up for a better view by more distant spectators.

That was possibly the most acceptable form of this; however, the ones I am referring to were real gibecieres. They didn't have a lot of room in them, though.

Vesting was also somewhat popular, especially up until the early 1900's.

Thank you for correcting my observation about your comments on table height, Mr. Palmer. I am actually in the process of planning to build a table from your plans (making scale drawings, selecting the balusters that will serve as the legs, etc). The height of the table should actually be determined, in my opinion, by the point between the bateleur's elbow and waist at which most of the sleights could be most comfortably performed. I think the hang of the gibeciere could be adjusted to the height of the table more conveniently than vice versa, and I think it is important for the arms to be comfortable and relaxed. Let me add that the origin of the servante as an improvisation with a tablecloth is intriguing.

You really need to work with a gibeciere a lot before you determine the correct height for it. It's determinable only by trial and error. Mine hangs at such a height that my fingertips will just touch the bottom of the inside of the bag comfortably when I'm working with it at the table. You will find that height to actually be what you need for doing table work, that is, for the sleights to be accomplished. You won't spend a lot of time hunched over the table.

Sometimes the correct height for the gibeciere is determined by your body and nothing else.

Mr. Palmer, I think we are on the same page. The operator must adjust the table, servante, and gibeciere to his own dimensions. "Comfortably" is I think the key word, although "ergonomic" might be preferred by some.

Without arguing with what is said about gibecière work (which are precious information), it should be underlined that the height of the table is not only directed by the presence of a gibecière.

For example Kent Gunn, for his outstanding C&Bs routine with multicolor balls, which doesn't involve a gibecière or gamebag of any sort, uses an elevated table of his own design (which he had to readapt after moaning about his original design).

There are also several C&Bs players who place a suitcase or briefcase or any form of elevation over their table to perform the C&Bs: this may be to offer a slanted surface but it is also to move the working surface up (then possibly automatically creating a servante on to the table itself behind the elevated working surface)

The improvisation of a suitcase placed on top of the table is also very intriguing. What if the suitcase could be modified or "chopped?"

As a point of historical interest, the magician's use of the gibeciere actually dates back to at least the early 15th century, as confirmed by period drawings and woodcuts of conjurors performing the cups and balls (see e.g. the German drawings from the so-called planet books reproduced in Volkmann's "The Oldest Deception : Cups & Balls in the Graphic Art of the 15th and 16 Century".

As far as the literature of C&B is concerned, the 1638 edition of Hocus Pocus (referring here to our own Bill Palmer's transliteration) refers to performers of cups and balls with "a budget hanging before them".

Interestingly, Ozanam's treatment of the Cups & Balls in his Recreations Mathematiques et Physiques, vol. 4 (1725) is entitled "Tricks with the Gibeciere" (transl.). Throughout the text, there are references to the movement of balls to and from the performer's giberciere.

Later in the 18th century, Guyot in his Nouvelles Recreations Physiques et Mathematiques, vol III (1774) proffered this advice :
"We give the name 'giberciere'to a kind of bag, about a foot long and eight to ten inches deep, fitted inside with several little pockets in which are placed the various pieces of the trick which can be found quickly and easily below the hand. It is attached in front by means of a belt."

Finally, there is a drawing of an early 18th century giberciere in the Spanish work "Enganos A Ojos Vistas y Diversion De Trabajos Mundanos(1733).

Fortasse

Posted: May 13, 2010 9:42am
...I should also have mentioned the 16th century (1571) fictional work by Folengo (1491-1544), Merlini Coccaji Maccaronices Libri XVII, in which Boccal is said to have performed his tricks with "his giberciere, which hung from his belt on the right side" - trans. (ref. Volkmann, "Conjurers of the Sixteenth Century", The Sphinx, vol.52 (1953).

Fortasse

Posted: May 13, 2010 9:46am
Lawrence O is, I think, completely correct about the servante having only come into use in the 19th century. I certainly have not been able to find any earlier references to it.

Fortasse

Posted: May 13, 2010 9:57am
Going back to Lawrence O's original post, I have been on a similar quest trying to discover the origins of Dai Vernon's classic C&B routine which is unquestionably the single most influential (certainly the most widely copied) C&B routine of the modern era. I know about all the references to Max Malini having inspired it and about Malini's habit of cutting up wine corks for his impromptu C&B performances but has anyone ever come across a blow-by-blow account of Malini's C&B routine so that it can be compared to Vernon's? Vernon himself shared little light on the matter, speaking only in generalities. I started a thread on this a while back but little in the way of solid, verifiable fact was ever forthcoming.

Fortasse

You mean I've been doing something right?? I've been practicing my own C&B routine using a Dean Dill performance table/pad with Dean's own servante. It makes things so easy. Here I thought I was using the easy way to help me with my loads and steals and it turns out to be a classical method? Go figure. I thought I had just stumbled onto an easier way to do things.


dsalley13

PS: Dean's servante is the bomb!! Best $20.00 I ever spent on Magical accessories.

Good research work: The Merlin Cocai book (which is very funny and served for Rabelais's Pantagruel who also performs magic) is very often overlooked for its lack of technical description -apart from the phrase that you mention)

You may have also mentioned that the author of the Spanish book you refer to were Minguet Y Irol, who were printers and were printing playing cards among other things but the book doesn't contain a C&Bs routine (you can search or save your time in believing me: Volkmann was wrong on this little point. I did look up carefully the four editions I have of this book and the cups only appear on the frontispiece of some editions)

Now I'm afraid that you are mistaken about Vernon's routine being a heir of Malini's routine. Johnny Thompson at my request did search in Charlie Miller [Charles Earl] notes (he had all the routines of Max Malini and Johnny inherited them) all the ingredients of the Malini's routine and, based on that, Johnny Thompson came with his own routine where the first sequence is the Malini's first sequence.

Since you know the Ozanam and Guyot, you know that the cup through cup and measuring the inside deeper than the outside came from the XVII century books.
The Wand spin comes from Silent Mora, the center ball traveling to a side cup designated by a spectator was published in a French book by Jean Caroly in 1902 and I translated it here in the café in some post, the stacking sequence was in Robert Houdin after being in the same Ozanam, Guyot and Ponsin...

Now this type of research p'sses me off a little bit because the beauty of the Vernon routine is not in the methods, not even in the choice of effects and their sequence in the routine. If you time the various films where the routine is offered, you would find that about 1/3 of the routine time is the initial patter: now how long does the total sum of the time for sleights last? This is just to say that what made the fame of this routine is not its technique and whether its comes from this or that source (inducing that we may miraculously find some other treasures which would have escaped the Professor), it's the personality and the charm of Dai Vernon, his patter, his unhurried timing, his variations in pace, his friendly communication with the audience... all of these things that make good magic and that people on the café keep ignoring despite the advice that famous magicians like Bill Palmer, Whit Hayden and less famous like myself, keep on hammering with not as much success as we would like to.

Now studying history is not a fault (or Bill and I are badly guilty) but don't search the secret of the C&Bs there, go into Designing Miracle by Darwin Ortiz and screen writing books before getting books or lessons in acting (Whit Haydn is a good resource on this as well)

Check Dai Vernon book: What is the first thing he wished to teach us: the Vernon Touch. That should say a lot. Study in detail, understand and learn Ascanio's The Magic of Arturo Ascanio vol 1 The Structural Conception of Magic; Study and learn and practice Tony Slydini's misdirection in the first chapters of The Magic World of Slydini… and more © by Karl Fulves where you'll learn how the chest drags the hands and not the other way around, and in Dennis Barlotta's The Master of Misdirection (referring to Slydini as well). For example you may surprised to learn that Antonio Romero's routine is entirely based on his foot positioning: it's what took him the longest time to perfect so that his body language could flow in casually. The scripting then is the most difficult art in a C&Bs routine: it should chisel what the effects are but without ever being descriptive... All of these research are the power beneath a good routine, not the history of the moves (that I found and keep finding delight in searching)

If you insist in looking for advanced methods, look towards the future with the Kent Gunn, Antonio Romero, Armando Lucero, Jason Latimer... if you want to find original routines in the past or the present, there are many ask Doug Peters, read the book on Fred Kaps routine that Pete Biro is re-writing, Bruno Copin's thread ideas for dislodging a ball from a chop cup without banging it, side magnet tools in the wand like William Zavis in England or Duraty in France, Gaetan Bloom's hanging servante that he did with his button's through the table. Believe me there is more to discover on the sides than behind.

Dsalley13

Does Dean gives any advice for the moves to get to the servante and come out of it without the move being detected? I just don't know this booklet (and the mat that comes with it) and thank you for having brought it in the discussion here.

You will find herebelow my own work in that direction



(to which I answered)

I've made myself this type of pad with servante. It's really easy to do. Take some wide woven cotton ribbon. Stick it to the inner lower side of the mat over about two inches. Stick a plastic semi-rigid electricity flat strip (about 1" wide and substantially shorter than the length of the mat) at the ends of the ribbons, keeping the length of the ribbons between the mat and the strip pretty small (like 2"). Have three SMALL cloth self opening pockets of the size of an envelope (equivalent to an inch less than the width of a playing card). Slide a wide magnetic rubber strip of the inner size of each pocket and stick it to the lower side of the pockets (the one that will be towards the audience). The rubber supplies relative rigidity and catches coins easily. Stick these pockets to the strip at the position where your hands will naturally come when they get in rest position on the mat (you'll find that it's not evenly spread).

Now I did write on the outer back of the mat in big bold white letters: "You're lucky, I'm the best!" (I did try other funny texts and settled for the versatility of this one). Before getting into performance, I fold the strip and pockets (with their load) on the surface of the mat and then I roll the mat up towards the outside. When getting into performance I come with the mat rolled under my arm and let it unroll with it's inner end passed the inner edge of the table but keeping hold of what will be the outer part of the mat and I look up as if checking the light. People think that the text they read is the reason for this position (a nice misdirection) and smile as I lay the mat down on the table discretely lining up, without looking the inner end (you very soon get the feeling because the ribbons supply a small resistance). Then I rub the surface with my right hand which allows me to check the alignment, and if need be I nonchalantly adjust it forwards or backwards.

One thing you may want to do if you go this way is to rehearse the proper moves to ditch into and/or steal from the pockets. What I did is to read Slydini's lapping technique and readapted the moves and misdirection to fit such a standing situation.

It's great to use in semi formal types of situations. You can even have people around as you can prevent them from finding the pockets suspicious, and, if your misdirection works well, they will not realize the ditching or stealing during a routine. If you are a little devious (I admit that I am), you do initial effects without using the servante but ditching in your pockets (or theirs) or using a hold out or a topit so that they register that the servante's pockets are not contributing to the deception but are there only for practical reasons like a drawer in a table (however you NEVER want to use the pockets as drawers for the servante should remain in the shade: keep taking your props from your pockets)

Now I work more strolling so I use it less, but it's a great tool well worth the fun you have making it.

PS: I need to give credit to Ross Bertram's Welcome Mat which was my inspiration for this but I wanted one that could be rolled instead of folded in order to avoid creases marks on the working surface. I also owe credit to someone whose name I forgot for the magnetic rubber (a phenomenally useful improvement) that he would stick before the show to the inner side of the table: here you come with a self sufficient mat. In the US, Stapples sells these wide magnetic rubber strips for paper or black boards. I would think that the are easy to get on the net

FYI, heres an illustration that I copped from an 1860s Baltimore Sun and used for my sinister magic purposes. The tiny objects on the table are little statues of justice is blind. Of course I no longer make the tables or pouches anymore but Harry Anderson used a No Slouch Pouch made by Gloria on one of his TV specials. This was in the early 1990s. Time does fly.

[quote]On 2010-05-13 12:52, Lawrence O wrote:
Dsalley13

Does Dean gives any advice for the moves to get to the servante and come out of it without the move being detected? I just don't know this booklet (and the mat that comes with it) and thank you for having brought it in the discussion here.

You will find herebelow my own work in that direction

[quote]

Mr. "O",

What looks like a booklet in the pix that I stole and provided, is merely Dean's package label. It does look like the typical Magic booklet, but it's printed on one side only. It comes with instructions for preparing it for use, but His Servante comes with no performance tips or hints. It doesn't fold or lay flat once formed to your liking. If you want to take it with you, you have to secret it in your close-up case.

On the other hand, what you just provided will help me dearly!!

I have been using some Neo magnets underneath Dean's Servante, near the top where it bends 90 degrees and hangs down. I can attach a chopped ball there easily and steel gaffed coins or shells (or a T.U.C.) and can easily thumb them to classic palm without been caught.

I copied and printed your advice on making a flat laying Servante and will slip it into my practice folder for immediate reference.

Thank you so much,

dsalley13

In reference to Lawrence O's last post, the following points call for clarification :

1. Firstly, I never suggested that Vernon's routine was, in fact, the heir to Malini's. On the contrary, I merely stated that I was aware of the references that suggested that to be the case. In fact, you will see from an earlier thread of mine here at the Café - "Origins of the Dai Vernon Routine" - that I personally expressed a great of skepticism about those claims - as indeed I continue to do. I have yet to see any credible evidence that either the structure or presentation of the Vernon routine was derived from Malini's.

2. Secondly, I am mystified by Lawrence O's assertion that the 1733 Spanish book to which I referred in my earlier posts today (viz. Enganos a Ojos Vistas y Diversion De Trabajos Mundanos) "doesn't contain a C&B's routine". I have before me a facsimile of the 1733 edition of this book (kindly presented to me by our Dr. Richard Evans). The first 25 pages of the book consist of a C&B routine (complete with illustrations). Mind you, it is completely plagiarized from Ozanam whose treatment of Cups & Balls had by this time been in circulation for about 10 years already but it is a fully developed C&B routine all the same. I can only surmise that Lawrence O. has confused the book to which I referred with another book, or perhaps an earlier or later edition of the same book in which the C&B routine perhaps did not appear. But it's sure in mine! Bill Palmer, I know, has the exact same facsimile edition as well.

3. Thirdly, speaking for myself personally I must confess that I am not nearly as enchanted by the "beauty" of Vernon's presentation as I am by the genius of his methods. In fact, at the risk of being considered impertinent, I thought his performances (as memorialized on videotape) were anything but beautiful. He had a thoroughly irritating voice and his presentation was - for my money at least - not nearly as scintillating as Charlie Miller's or Johnny Thompson's or the newer magicians like Rafael Benatar, Al Schneider, to name a few. But what Vernon did bring to the table and what set him apart from all comers, at least as far as the C&B was concerned, was his inspired genius in conceiving an absolutely brilliant routine, not for its individual phases (none of which bear the stamp of originality except for the ending sequence) but for the divine sum of its constituent parts.

4. Which brings me to this final point : the timeless appeal of the Cups & Balls lies, I think, in the fact it encapsulates a mosaic that captures our intelligence and our senses on so many diverse levels. Some of us are only interested in the performance of the Cups & Balls. Others of us have an armchair interest in the evolution of the trick in the context of the broader historical and cross-cultural currents that swept it along. Still others of us are interested in collecting cups and comparing the size and the construct of the lips and beads and saddles of the cups we collect. Still others of us are drawn in some inexplicable way to this particular trick because it resonates deep within us at a level where we feel connected to the magi of centuries, nay millennia, past who performed this trick much as we perform it today. And then there are those of us - and I venture to think that the great majority of my confreres here at the Café fall into this category - who do all of the above. In so doing, we enrich their lives beyond measure and, in so doing, help light a path for others to follow when we are gone.
Let's honour the Cups & Balls - and the study of it - for all it has to offer. It is indeed a many splendoured thing!

Fortasse

Posted: May 13, 2010 9:42pm
In reference to Lawrence O's last post, the following points call for clarification :

1. Firstly, I never suggested that Vernon's routine was, in fact, the heir to Malini's. On the contrary, I merely stated that I was aware of the references that suggested that to be the case. In fact, you will see from an earlier thread of mine here at the Café - "Origins of the Dai Vernon Routine" - that I personally expressed a great deal of skepticism about those claims - as indeed I continue to do. I have yet to see any credible evidence that either the structure or presentation of the Vernon routine was derived from Malini's.

2. Secondly, I am mystified by Lawrence O's assertion that the 1733 Spanish book to which I referred in an earlier post today (viz. Enganos a Ojos Vistas y Diversion De Trabajos Mundanos) "doesn't contain a C&B's routine". I have before me a facsimile of the 1733 edition of this book (kindly presented to me by our Dr. Richard Evans). The first 25 pages of the book consist of a C&B routine (complete with illustrations). Mind you, it is completely plagiarized from Ozanam whose treatment of Cups & Balls had by this time been in circulation for about 10 years but it is a fully developed C&B routine all the same. I can only surmise that Lawrence O. has confused the book to which I referred with another book, or perhaps an earlier or later edition of the same book in which the C&B routine perhaps did not appear. But it's sure in mine! Bill Palmer, I know, has the exact same facsimile edition as well.

3. Thirdly, speaking for myself personally I must confess that I am not nearly as enchanted by the "beauty" of Vernon's presentation as I am by the genius of his methods. In fact, at the risk of being considered impertinent, I thought his performances (as memorialized on videotape) were anything but beautiful. He had a thoroughly irritating voice and his presentation was - for my money at least - not nearly as scintillating as Charlie Miller's or Johnny Thompson's or the newer magicians like Rafael Benatar, Al Schneider, to name a few. But what Vernon did bring to the table and what set him apart from all comers, at least as far as the C&B was concerned, was his inspired genius in conceiving an absolutely brilliant routine, not for its individual phases (none of which bear the stamp of originality except for the ending sequence) but for the divine sum of its constituent parts.

4. Which brings me to this final point : the timeless appeal of the Cups & Balls lies, I think, in the fact it encapsulates a mosaic that captures our intelligence and our senses on so many diverse levels. Some of us are interested in the performance of the Cups & Balls. Others of us have an armchair interest in the evolution of the trick in the context of the broader historical and cross-cultural currents that swept it along. Still others of us are interested in collecting cups and comparing the size and the construct of the lips and beads and saddles of the cups we collect. Still others of us are drawn in some inexplicable way to this particular trick because it resonates deep within us at a level where we feel connected to the magi of centuries, nay millennia, past who performed this trick much as we perform it today. And then there are those of us - and I venture to think that the great majority of my confreres here at the Café fall into this category - who do all of the above. In so doing, we enrich our lives beyond measure and, in so doing, help light a path for others to follow when we are gone.
Let's honour the Cups & Balls - and the study of it - for all it has to offer. It is indeed a many splendoured thing!

Fortasse

I may have read Lawrence O's statement about Engaños a Ojos Vistos a bit differently. I believe he stated that the cups only appear in the frontispiece in certain editions. I know that both editions I have -- one in a facsimile and the other as a photocopy have full cups and balls routines, basically cadged from French sources -- and so does the English translation of the 1733 edition that was recently issued by Conjuring Arts. However, I also know that there are many different editions of that book. It is basically the Hocus Pocus Junior of the Spanish language.

Nevertheless, I started learning to read Spanish so I could figure out what it said.

I think we need to be careful, though, of how much "inner secret" stuff we let loose in this part of the forum.

Bill : What he actually said was that "the book doesn't contain a C&Bs routine".

Posted: May 14, 2010 1:17am
Incidentally, a complete English translation of Pablo Minguet's 1733 book appears in last summer's edition of Giberciere, published by the Conjuring Arts Research Center to which many of us here subscribe. It includes the full translated text of the chapter on the cups & Balls routine. So I'm really curious as to what Lawrence O was talking about when he says that the book doesn't contain it.

Fortasse

I see that now. I was just looking at the last half of the paragraph. Both of the Spanish editions I have of that book have the cups and balls in them.

All three editions if you include the translation from Conjuring Arts.

Yes this is what I wrote and I was wrong. My bad, I must have made a confusion in my notes.

Bill or Fortasse, if you have the book handy, would you be so kind as to look up on the title page and print here the Publisher (most probably Minguet Y Irol themselves), the date (most probably 1750), the place, and the page number for the Cups and balls (most of my books are presently in storage)

Thanks and please accept my apologies for the mistake, gentlemen

The facsimile edition that I have is called
Engaños a Ojos Vistas,
y Diversion
de Trabajos Mundanos,
Fundada
En Licitos Juegos de Manos,

by Pablo Minguet e Irol

Below the title and author, it states

CON PRIVILEGIO
--------------------------------------
EN MADRID: En la Imprenta de D. Pedro
Joseph Alonso y Padilla, Librero de Ca-
mara del Rey nuestro Señor

This may have been a self-published book.

Also, note that the author's name is given as Pablo Minguet e Irol on the title page, but in the text, it is given as Pablo Minguet e Yrol.

This is the edition of 1733.

Thank you, Bill. If I may ask: at what page do the C&Bs appear

They actually appear on page 2. Page 1 shows an illustration of the gibeciere, with explicatory text. Then page 2 gives a description of what the gibeciere is used for. Page 3 shows an illustration of the cups and balls that looks like it came right out of Ozanam. The section on the cups and balls actually follows several pages of introductory material, including a couple of pages of permissions and/or licenses to publish the book.

It's very important to remember that this was the first Spanish language book on magic. The reason this is such a milestone is that the Spanish Inquisition did not officially end until about 100 years later.

Minguet was a very talented writer whose works cover everything from how to play musical instruments, dance, art, science and conjuring.