Wow. Lapping must be old. But I need something to date it. I've heard of course that Slydini helped spread lapping in the magic community, but can anyone dig up an earlier source? I really need an actual source.

The earliest published reference I have on lapping as a technique was Slydini's "The Art of Using the Lap as a Servante," which was originally published as a single release in the Stars of Magic Series in 1954.

Obviously, people who have performed seated have used the lap for prop disposition for much longer than that, but Slydini basically refined it. He was the one who figured out how to get things into the lap without arousing suspicion, and how to get them out of the lap without anyone noticing it.

Have a look at the penetration trick in Scot's Discoverie of Witchcraft using a bowl.

Traditional tricks like the napkin covered salt shaker thru table and others pre-date Slydini in terms of ditching stuff in your lap, but the techniques Slydini employed - like those from Stars of Magic - made Slydini's reputation and brought into play an era of new methods and tricks including modern classics like Coins Thru Table.

Discoverie dates from the 1500's - way before Slydini and Vernon.

I'll have to look that up. Do you do any material from Discoverie?

Ah, yes, the famous "groat and bason" trick.

I don't think what we see in Scot or Hocus Pocus, Jr. has anything near the refinement or quality of the work Slydini did with lapping as a real technique.

If you do a cut and restored rope, or a version of Grandmother's necklace, you are, essentially, performing material from Discoverie.

I think a more interesting question, and one which possibly has no answer, is when "stand up magicians" became "sit down magicians" so that lapping became possible as a technique. Did Slydini popularize "sit down magic" first, or simply take advantage of a new style that was making the rounds of smaller venues like night clubs and bar rooms?

Magicians who worked at dinner tables often sat. That's why some of the material in Scot as well as Hocus Pocus Junior refers to working at a table in a pub.

Magicians began to work standing up when they were able to adapt the workman's apron and/or the poacher's pouch to use as a magical tool.

As I recall, and I may be wrong, Slydini used a move called the "Imp Pass" to retrieve the lapped items.
Bill, is this correct ??
Rennie

Yes. That's correct.

I've seen a lot of people who telegraphed their lapping ... from the moment they sat down at the table. They would do the thumb-little finger gauge to position their chair. That fairly well tips off what is going to happen.

Close-up at a table is really not a practical way to perform any more. If you are a restaurant magician, every time you sit down at a table, you are taking up a paying space. If you are performing at the dinner table, the chances are that you are probably not a worker, but a guest.

Slydini's table magic, beatiful as it was, always seemed contrived to me. You have a man sitting at the front of the room, with a table that is draped to the floor.

This is not intended to be a criticism of Slydini, but simply a reflection on the artificiality of that type of performing.

I think if you ask Martin Lewis he will tell you of a magician he worked with at Eartquake McGoon's in San Framcisco who produced a dove at the close-up table every show and then vanished it the same way.

I think if you performed a dove production in a restaurant in Texas, the restaurant could be busted for health violations. Doves are far more likely to carry a disease than, say, a dog or a cat.

The magician you are referring to was probably Johnny Ace Palmer.

Those of us who don't have the historical perspective of Bill or Jonathan don't understand a lot of pre-Houdin sleight of hand isn't documented. We can reconstruct it from performance documentation. It seems likely that a "poisonous feast" taken at a table in a pub might have involved some lapping.

My own exploration of Indian and Asian street theater is evolving into some seated, cross legged and kneeling performances which present some interesting opportunities for lapping. For that matter, sleeving into a kimono is a hoot.

Not having Bill or Jonathan's expertise, my work is not authentic. It is interpretive, presenting traditional routines, but taking full advantage of modern methods. The traditional, Asian stuff people have shown me over the years doesn't hold up to modern magic. There isn't much reason to assume older Western illusions where much stronger. Lapping has probably been around forever in some form. Card cheats and quacks couldn't really be expected to publish their methods.

The work of the Indian street performers, especially concerning working with the bag, the pants, and even the assistant's costume (if there is an assistant) is really analagous to lapping.

Lapping is def underused

Def.

Have a careful look at Roth's coin book.

I use it all the time, even when standing up. Just because you're not sitting down and therefore have no lap available doesn't mean you can't employ the same table moves to shoost an object into a different, more available location. "Shoost" is a very old technical term I just made up for lapping without a lap.

HeeHee: When SLYCINI'S lapping technique was "coming into vogue", the story is that OKITO (posing a rhetorical question) asked, "But, when you stand up, where does your lap go?"