The Accounts
It is commonly (though erroneously) believed that Marco Polo (1254–1324), a Venetian trader and explorer who gained fame for his Asiatic travels, witnessed the rope trick in India and China; see "explanation" below for further information.
Ibn Batuta, when recounting his travels through Hangzhou, China in 1346, describes a trick broadly similar to the Indian rope trick.
Pu Songling records a version in Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio (1740) which he claims to have witnessed personally. In his account, a request by a mandarin that a wandering magician produce a peach in the dead of winter results in the trick's performance, on the pretence of getting a peach from the Gardens of Heaven. The magician's son climbs the rope, vanishes from sight, and then (supposedly) tosses down a peach, before being "caught by the Garden's guards" and "killed", with his dismembered body falling from above in the traditional manner. (Interestingly enough, in this version the magician himself never climbs the rope) After placing the parts in a basket, the magician gives the mandarin the peach and requests payment. As soon as he is paid, his son emerges alive from the basket. Songling claims the trick was a favorite of the White Lotus Society and that the magician must have learnt it from them, though he gives no indication where (or how) he learnt this.
It is said that similar tricks were performed during the Mughal Empire (16th-19th centuries). They reputedly occurred in the Indian subcontinent from Peshawar to Dhaka, and at important centers of Mughal powers, including Murshidabad, Patna, Agra, and Delhi. During the British Raj, the trick was allegedly witnessed around 1850 and 1900. The Chicago Tribune, in 1890, published an article about the trick, written by a journalist using the false name of Fred S. Ellmore—a story which was repeated in several other newspapers without its authenticity first being verified. Latest performance of this trick, partially though is reported by BBC in 1990s from India by Magicians Inshamudheen Delhi and Padmaraj
Read more about this topic: Indian Rope Trick
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