Henslowe deals the cards

October 18, 2024 4:46 AM

What happens when a 16thC manuscript page from the diary of Philip Henslowe (~1550 – 1616) is pushed in front of a math-wonk who a) recognises a problem in modulo arithmetic b) finds an error in the protocol? A card trick that stitches together Arts, STEM and edutainment.

Henslowe who he? An impressario and producer "do you think it's funny?", owner of The Rose playhouse, and a diarist of the Elizabethan drama scene in London. "Doctor's" handwriting that required a) transcription (tacke xij cards wth the knaue of clubes & laye them round licke a clocke) then b) translation into modern English.

posted by BobTheScientist (2 comments total)

I'm just in awe that cigars hadn't made their way to London yet. (When did they get there? Why did it take so long? Is the earliest reference to them really Byron...that seems too distant!)
posted by mittens at 6:41 AM on October 18

This is very neat--thanks! For comparison, there are tricks a little like this collected in Newe Recreation, or the Mindes release and solacing (1631). The first half of the book provides long lists of things the volunteer can choose and a standard method for figuring out which item was chosen, but the second half of the book has a bunch of ways to use arithmetic to get to, like, the same number that someone originally had in mind. I also know of A Rich Cabinet with Variety of Inventions, Unlock'd and Open'd, for the Recreation of Ingenious Spirits (1689), which has "Many Cards placed in divers ranks, to find which of these Cards any one hath thought"--which at a glance may be the same as this trick that appeared in Le Manuel des sorciers (1801) too. The second edition of Le Manuel des sorciers added a bunch of parlor games that led me to this stuff. Incidentally, the 'pre-programmed' tables in Newe Recreation were also a feature of recreational divination manuals like The dodechedron of fortune; or, The exercise of a quick wit (1613 but translated from French editions e.g. from 1556).
posted by Wobbuffet at 8:09 AM on October 18 [1 favorite]