View source for Cups and balls

{{short description|Magic illusion trick}}
{{distinguish|cup-and-ball}}
[[File:Johnny Fox performing at Maryland Renaissance Festival - 08.jpg|thumb|[[Johnny Fox (performer)|Johnny Fox]] performing a cups and balls routine at [[Maryland Renaissance Festival]]. A [[gibeciere]] can be seen around his waist.]]
[[Image:Hieronymus Bosch 051.jpg|thumb|250px|[[Hieronymus Bosch]]: ''[[The Conjurer (painting)|The Conjurer]]'', 1475–1480. Notice the person on the far left is stealing a man's purse while he is distracted by the game]]

The '''cups and balls''' is a performance of [[Magic (illusion)|magic]] with innumerable adaptations. Street gambling variations performed by conmen were known as Bunco Booths.{{citation needed|date=November 2024}} A typical cups and balls routine includes many of the most fundamental effects of magic: the balls can vanish, appear, transpose, reappear and transform.<ref name="Lydia Darbyshire 2002"/> Basic skills, such as [[misdirection (magic)|misdirection]], [[manual dexterity]], [[sleight of hand]], and audience management are also essential to most cups and balls routines. As a result, mastery of the cups and balls is considered by many as the litmus test of a magician's skill with gimmick style tricks. Magician [[John Mulholland (magician)|John Mulholland]] wrote that [[Harry Houdini]] had expressed the opinion that no one could be considered an accomplished magician until he had mastered the cups and balls.<ref>{{cite book|title=Introduction to Cups and Balls Magic|first=Tim|last=Osborne|year=1937}}</ref> Professor Hoffman called the cups and balls "the groundwork of all legerdemain".<ref>{{cite book|title=Modern Magic|last=Professor Hoffman|year=1878}}</ref>

Instead of cups, other types of covers can be used, such as bowls or hats. The [[shell game]] con is a rogue variant of the cups and balls used as a [[confidence trick]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Shell game|publisher=Encyclopædia Britannica|url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/539702/shell-game}}</ref>

==History==
The effect, also known as ''acetabula et calculi'', was performed by Roman conjurers as far back as two thousand years ago, as referred to in Seneca's 45th Epistle to Lucilius:<ref name="Seneca's 45th">{{cite book|first=Lucius Annaeus|last=Seneca|title=Moral Epistles Volume 1|editor-first=Richard M|editor-last=Gummere|publisher=The Loeb Classical Library|location=Cambridge, Mass.|year=1917–25}}</ref>
{{Verse translation|Sic ista sine noxa decipiunt quomodo praestigiatorum acetabula et calculi, in quibus me fallacia ipsa delectat. Effice ut quomodo fiat intellegam: perdidi lusum.|Such quibbles are just as harmlessly deceptive as the juggler's cup and dice, in which it is the very trickery that pleases me.  But show me how the trick is done, and I have lost my interest therein.}}

One popularly circulated picture, thought to date from 2500 B.C. from the walls of a burial chamber in Beni Hasan, Egypt,<ref name="Maurine Christopher 2006">{{cite book|last1=Christopher|first1=Maurine|last2=Christopher|first2=Milbourne|year=2006|title=The Illustrated History of Magic|publisher=Avalon Publishing Group|location=New York}}</ref> shows two men kneeling over four inverted bowls. It was taken by early Egyptologists Wilkinson<ref>{{cite book|last=Wilkinson|first=John Gardner|title=The Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, Volume II|editor1-first=Samuel|editor1-last=Birch|editor2-first=John|editor2-last=Murray|location=London|year=1878}}</ref> and Newberry<ref>{{cite book|last=Newberry|first=Percy|title=Beni Hassan Part II|publisher=Egypt Exploration Fund|location=London|year=1893}}</ref> as evidence that the cups and balls effect, or its related deceptive gambling game, [[shell game|thimblerig]], possibly dates back to Ancient Egypt. Because of its context, modern Egyptologists regard the image as a game using pots<ref>{{cite book|last=Decker|first=Wolfgang|title=Sports and Games of Ancient Egypt|editor-first=Allen|editor-last=Guttman|publisher=The American University in Cairo Press|year=1993|pages=123, 124}}</ref> or cups<ref>{{cite book|last1=Kanawati|first1=Naguib|last2=Woods|first2=Alexandra|title=Beni Hassan - Art and Daily Life in an Egyptian Province|publisher=Supreme Council of Antiquities Press|location=Cairo|year=2010|page=43}}</ref> but details of the game are unknown. The illustration is unique in ancient Egyptian art, so whether or not the game utilizes sleight of hand trickery may never be known unless a future discovery produces a similar image in a more explanatory context.

==Performance and variations==
[[File:ChristianFarlaCupsandBalls.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[Christian Farla]] performs Cups and Balls on stage.]]
The most widely performed version of the effect uses three cups and three small balls.<ref name="Ammar 1998">{{cite book|last=Ammar|first=Michael|title=The complete cups and balls|year=1998|publisher=L & L Publishing}}</ref> The magician makes the balls appear to pass through the solid bottoms of the cups, jump from cup to cup, disappear from the cup and appear in other places, or vanish from various places and reappear under the cups (sometimes under the same cup), often ending with larger objects, such as fruit, larger balls, small animals such as baby chicks, or a combination of the different final loads. Many magicians use fruit, as each one is different in shape and size, thus increasing the element of surprise.<ref name="Lydia Darbyshire 2002">{{cite book|last=Darbyshire|first=Lydia|year=1997|title=The Magic Book|publisher=Booksales}}</ref>

===Basic routine===
Starting with three cups set down in a line with three balls visible, one of the balls is put on top of the centre cup and the other two cups nested above. With a tap of the wand, the three cups are lifted, revealing that the ball has "penetrated" the cup. Again the cups are set in a line, the middle cup covering the ball which has already penetrated. Another of the visible balls is placed on top of the centre cup and covered with the other two cups, the cups being tapped and lifted to show the second ball has penetrated. This is repeated with the third ball.

===Medieval cups and balls===
In 1584 Reginald Scot wrote ''[[The Discoverie of Witchcraft]]'',<ref>{{cite book|title=The Discoverie of Witchcraft|first=Reginald|last=Scot|year=1584}}</ref> within which he describes tricks with balls. He recommends using candlesticks with a hollow underneath, or bowls, or salt cellars covers to cover the balls. He describes the routine with three or four balls, and as many covers. He describes placing a ball under each cover, lifting the covers to show the balls vanished, and then having the balls all re-appear under one cover. Although Scot describes a method, it is considered by magicians to be unlikely as some of the moves described would be impossible to perform invisibly.{{citation needed|date=December 2017}}

===Indian cups and balls===
In India, the cups and balls were performed seated on the ground, with an audience stood, or in chairs around the performer.<ref name="The Hindu Cups by Eddie Joseph">{{cite book|title=The Hindu Cups|first=Eddie|last=Joseph}}</ref> This unique line of sight for the audience gave rise to some unique sleight of hand moves. The cups that are used are shaped like a shallow bell, a shallow bowl with a small knob handle on the top. They are often held between the first two fingers by this handle. The shallow nature of the cups means that a large item cannot be produced at the end of the routine, so the routine is often ended with the production of many of the same sized balls,<ref name="The Hindu Cups by Eddie Joseph"/> although Shankar Junior would end with the production of black powder from one of the bowls. The number of cups and balls used varies, with between one and five balls in play during the routine, and between two and four cups.

===Owan To Tama===
Owan To Tama, the "Turning of Bowls" is the Japanese version of the cups and balls. The magician uses three bowls, and traditionally four soft silk covered balls, a fan and three final productions, either oranges or boxes, sometimes of cigarettes.<ref name="Richard Kaufman 1990">{{cite book|title=The Amazing Miracles of Shigeo Takagi|first=Richard|last=Kaufman|year=1990}}</ref> The movements of the Japanese routine are based on Japanese classical dance.<ref name="Takeshi Nemoto 1982">{{cite book|title=Tokyo Trickery|first=Takeshi|last=Nemoto|year=1982}}</ref> There is a display to show the bowls used called "''Owan-Gaeshi''" where the performer passes the bowls from hand to hand, showing them empty in a dance-like manner. The routine has been described as having a reverent, ceremonial air.<ref name="Richard Kaufman 1990"/> The routine was also performed kneeling on the floor, for a kneeling audience. Unlike other cups and balls routines the Japanese magician would usually work inside, and to music.<ref name="Takeshi Nemoto 1982"/>

==="Bean sowing"===
The Chinese routine of the cups and balls is often called "The Immortal Sowing Beans" and originated in ancient agricultural society prior to the [[Shang dynasty]] {{nowrap|({{em|c.}}{{tsp}}1600{{px2}}–{{hsp}}}}1046{{spaces}}[[Common era|BCE]]), {{citation needed span|date=August 2024|likely as early as the [[Longshan culture]] period.}} It takes its name from the saying "Plant melons and you get melons; sow beans and you get beans".<ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite book|title=Chinese Classical Illusion Magic|last1=Fu|first1=QiFeng|last2=Xu|first2=Qiu|year=2009}}</ref>

The props used consisted of a fan, a mat, between two and six bowls, and between three and ten beans. The most common variant used two bowls with either three or five beans.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> The Chinese method is unusual in that an extra bean or ball is rarely used, and it employs atypical methods of concealing the beans. Traditionally the routine was performed on the ground, but in present times it is more commonly performed on a table.<ref name="ReferenceA"/>

Another typical element of the Chinese routine is to both begin and end the performance in dramatic fashion. Common routines include changing a small peach into an egg, producing water (sometimes with fish), or producing [[Baijiu]]. The finale "Harvesting a Million Beans" involves placing two bowls mouth to mouth one on top of the other, then, when the top bowl is slowly lifted from the bottom bowl (which may have contained, {{em|e.g.}},{{spaces}}only water before) the lower bowl is seemingly overflowing with ("a million") tiny beans.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> While, as with the Indian routine, the Chinese do not always conclude this performance in dramatic fashion, one performer that is known to is 王鬼手 ("Wang Gui Shou"), whose name means "king of ghost hands".

===Modern cups and balls: the Dai Vernon routine===
The cups and balls have a long history, and the routines performed by today's performers are built upon the work of previous masters. In ancient Greece and Rome magicians would perform standing behind a table, as opposed to on the ground as seen in Egypt, India and Turkey, to allow a larger audience to see the show,<ref name="Maurine Christopher 2006"/> and this tradition has continued today. Tall conical shaped metal cups were the norm in Europe and Egypt until the routine by [[Dai Vernon]] became popular using shorter, more squat cups that were about as tall as the hand.  Similar squat cups were popularised by the likes of Paul Fox, Charlie Miller and Ross Bertram.

Dai Vernon's influence can be seen in many modern routines. Jim Cellini, a student of [[Tony Slydini]] and teacher of many street performers, credits his routine to Vernon, Miller, and [[Johnny Fox (performer)|Johnny Fox]].<ref>{{cite book|title=Cellini - The Royal Touch, A Guide To The Art Of Street Magic|last=McFalls|first=E.M.|year=1997|publisher=Magical Classics|location=Zurich}}</ref> Dai Vernon's student, [[Michael Ammar]], of whom Louis Falanga, President of L&L Publishing, said: "Ammar has literally led the industry in shaping the thinking and performing of this generation of magicians", created his own routine based upon what his teacher had taught him.

The Vernon routine consists of vanishing the three balls, to reappear under the cups, the penetration of the balls through the cups, the spectator choosing which cup to invisibly transport a ball to, the removal and return of the balls, and the revelation of the final large production items, usually fruit.<ref name="Ammar 1998"/> Watching a modern performance of cups and balls, one is likely to see a similar sequence followed.

===Chop cup===
A fairly modern development is the 'chop cup'. This cup was invented around 1954 by [[Al Wheatley]] who performed a Chinese-costumed act with the name "Chop Chop".<ref name="Maurine Christopher 2006"/> The chop cup is a variation with one cup and (seemingly) one ball, hugely popular because it requires only a very small flat area to perform, unlike the considerable table space needed for the classic three-cup routine. The Chicago close-up magician [[Don Alan]] performed his streamlined chop cup routine on television.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ll4Hsa1XalE|title=Don Alan - Chop Cup|last=|first=|date=|website=YouTube|access-date=}}</ref> and was immediately copied by magicians all over the world. [[Paul Daniels]]' routine with the chop cup has also done a lot for the routine's popularity.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io-Bby3iWVs|title=Paul Daniels Magic Show - Chop Cup Routine|last=|first=|date=|website=YouTube|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140713134552/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io-Bby3iWVs |archive-date=2014-07-13 |access-date=}}</ref> The chop cup can be handled entirely by the top, creating a more seemingly impossible performance.

===Three shell game===
{{main|Shell game}}
The three [[shell game]] is similar in some respects to the three cup routine. In it, the main move is a steal of the pea from the back of the shell. This is achieved by using a flexible pea and performing the trick on a soft surface. The pea is squeezed out under the back of the shell into the fingers in the act of pushing the shell forward. In a similar way, the pea can be introduced under a shell by drawing it back. These moves are made casually in swapping the positions of the shells. The spectator is supposed to follow by eye which shell has the pea, but in reality, they have no chance of success as the performer is always one step ahead of the spectators.

===Clear Cups===

====Penn & Teller====
The magic duo [[Penn & Teller]] performs a version of the cups and balls trick in their act.<ref>Archived at [https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/GmwT7L0hToQ Ghostarchive]{{cbignore}} and the [https://web.archive.org/web/20190128043426/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmwT7L0hToQ Wayback Machine]{{cbignore}}: {{cite web|title=Youtube.com: Penn and Teller cups and balls| website=[[YouTube]] |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmwT7L0hToQ}}{{cbignore}}</ref> Initially, they perform the trick with small [[aluminum foil]] balls and plastic cups. The trick ends with the appearance of larger foil balls under the cups, and the surprise appearance of an extra unrelated object, such as a potato or a lime, under one or more cups. They then repeat the trick using transparent plastic cups, claiming that they will reveal how to perform the trick.<ref name=andrewmusgrave>{{cite web | url=http://sleightly.com/blog/2010/02/22/penn-and-teller-expose-the-cups-and-balls/ | title=Penn and Teller Expose the Cups and Balls |publisher=[[Ye Olde Magick Blogge]] |year=2010 | first=Andrew | last=Musgrave| url-status=usurped |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120724091134/http://sleightly.com/blog/2010/02/22/penn-and-teller-expose-the-cups-and-balls/|archivedate=24 July 2012}}</ref> However, as part of the joke, they do the trick so fast as to make it difficult to follow. They claim that this version of the cups and balls breaks all four rules of magic: not to tell the audience how a trick is done, not to repeat the same trick twice, not to show the audience the secret preparation, and the "unwritten rule" never to perform the cups and balls with clear plastic cups.{{citation needed|date=October 2022}}

====Latimer Clear Cups and Balls====
The [[Latimer Clear Cups And Balls]] is an illusion, created and performed by American illusionist [[Jason Latimer]]. In this version of the "follow the ball" cups and balls game, the magician uses clear glass cups and the audience can watch as the balls visually vanish and jump to underneath another cup.<ref name="Magic Aid">{{cite news|title=This Is A Nice Trick|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-dec-08-wk-alt8-story.html|access-date=31 January 2013|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|date=Dec 8, 2005}}</ref><ref name="World Champion of Magic Winners">{{cite web|title=World Champion of Magic Winners|url=http://fism.org/web/championship-contests/fism-winners/fism-winners-2000-to-2009/|publisher=FISM|accessdate=31 January 2013}}</ref> The effect was debuted by Jason Latimer in 2003 at [[International Federation of Magic Societies]] ([[FISM]]), and on US television on ''[[The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson]]'' in 2004.

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*[http://www.rnt2.com/ RNT2 – World's Largest Manufacturer of Cups and Balls]
*[http://www.cupsandballsmagic.com/ Cups and Balls Magic – Reviews, Articles and News]

==Further reading==
* {{cite journal|title=Perceptual elements in Penn & Teller's "Cups and Balls" magic trick|author=Rieiro|volume=1|pages=e19|journal=[[PeerJ]]|doi=10.7717/peerj.19|display-authors=etal|pmc=3628988|pmid=23638353|year=2013 |doi-access=free }}

{{Magic and Illusion}}

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[[Category:Magic tricks]]

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