For those that haven't heard of this shuffle check it out at WIKI:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuffle

Has anyone come across a practical use for this unusual "shuffle" - maybe an effect or setting up a stack?

I find it weird if you repeat the shuffle for 52 cards you get back to the original deck order after just 10 shuffles, half the number of cards and it takes 50 shuffles, or even worse if you add 2 jokers to the deck it takes 70 shuffles!

Any thoughts? (..other than I should get out more ).

Lew Brooks, in Stack Attack, uses the Monge Shuffle in "Order Out Of Chaos".

Thanks Scott I've checked that out now - I notice Lew doesn't refer to the shuffle by name - but a decent application never the less - gives me a few more ideas.

So if it take 10 shuffles to get back to the original then I guess you're suggesting that the deck be stacked and nine shuffles be preformed before the presentation.

The only thing I use a stacked deck for is the ten card poker deal. I've been using a couple of weak false shuffles....This would be better, Thanks.

It would be great to find a shortcut to put the deck in the position it would be in following the ninth shuffle.

Do all smaller pack sizes require a greater number of shuffles?

Wes picking up on your points:

>>So if it take 10 shuffles to get back to the original then I guess you're suggesting that the deck be stacked and nine shuffles be preformed before the presentation.
Yes similar to the way Faro's are often exploited.

>>It would be great to find a shortcut to put the deck in the position it would be in following the ninth shuffle.
Do you mean in performance or before-hand? In performance would be tricky - if you were to go thru all the shuffles required - the spec would probably nod off

It's possible to stack the deck - as Lew did - to be one Monge away from the desired order. I can list the one-away stacking orders if you want..

>>Do all smaller pack sizes require a greater number of shuffles?
No - it's a little more weird than that!
(Maybe 9 cards at only 5 shuffles could be 'processed' in front of the spec?)

1..6 cards = 1..6 shuffles respectively
7 cards=10 shuffles
8=14
9=5
10=18
11=10
12=12
13=21
14=26
15=9
16=30
17=6
18=22
19=9
20=30
21=27
22=8
23=11
24=10
25=24
26=50
27=12
28=18
29=14
30=12
31=55
32=50
33=7
34=18
35=34
36=46
37=14
38=74
39=24
40=26
41=33
42=20
43=78
44=86
45=29
46=90
47=18
48=18
49=48
50=98
51=33
52=10
53=45
54=70

Any ideas/comments/questions on the Monge shuffle appreciated..

Stepseven,

If you have that setup that would be a big help.

Example - Set up 10 cards in this order:

1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th
Ace 10 2 9 3 8 4 7 5 6

one Monge shuffle and you have Ace..Ten


Is that what you mean Wes?

Lew uses some other stack and shuffling ideas to further obscure what is going on, but you'll have to get his book for the exact working. The basic set up above should start you off

I need a shuffle where the top thirty and the bottom nine cards remain the same....or I need to stack the deck so that I am one shuffle away from putting the top thirty and bottom nine in the order I need them.

I going to look into Lew Brooks's Stack Attack.

Retain top 30 & bottom 9.. That would be beyond my shuffling skills at the moment.
Maybe a very uneven riffle?
Maybe you could do it with false cuts?
How perfect are your faros? You could do it with that - set up the deck one faro away and bingo (if you can guarentee you can pull the faro off).

A Monge would look way too contrived (and take too long) as you did all 52 cards!

I've gotten the faro close but I always have a few card doubled up.

I'm thinking about leaving the top twenty two Monge's away, doing a couple false cuts, Monge the top twenty do a false cut and Monge the top twenty again. I should look like I mixed the top half of the deck and then the bottom half.

I agree Stepseven - I don't see ever wanting to use the Monge shuffle. I don't think it really even gives the appearance of a shuffle - it's orderly. Plus, your audience is going to be drooling over themselves by the time you're finished.

Does anyone know why it's called a "Monge" shuffle? Who, or what, is "Monge?" And, how do you pronounce the word "Monge?"

It is more a math thing . . .

To answer my own question, above: the Monge shuffle is named after a French mathematician, Gaspard Monge, of the 17th-18th centuries, I think, who wrote about this shuffle. I take it, then, that it should be given a nice French pronunciation, which I won't try to represent here.

As to the shuffle seeming too "orderly," Peter Duffie says (in the directions for his routine "Tohu Bohu" in his book "21 Card Tricks") that he likes to use the Monge shuffle because it looks SLOPPY. I kind of agree with Peter.

As to your spectators "drooling over themselves by the time you're finished," I don't think it's usually done with a full deck anyway, is it? It's used for small packet tricks like the ones Werner Miller outlines in some recent contributions to Online Visions.

For five cards it only takes 3 shuffles to return to the original sequence.

The Monge shuffle is used by Bruce Kundin for the effect "Mental Vacation" on his DVD "Miraculous Mentalism with Minimal Manipulation" available exclusively at whiterabbit-magic dot com

Three shuffles is quick and effective to convince the spectator they are well "mixed."