FORTEAN TIMES UNCONVENTION 1997
RICHARD WISEMAN: THE INDIAN ROPE TRICK
The Indian Rope Trick. This trick was supposed to have been performed in the streets in India between 1850 and 1900. A fakir would throw a rope in the air where it would remain erect. A small boy, the fakir's assistant, would climb the rope and disappear at the top. Then the fakir would ascend the rope with a knife. He would reach the top and stab the air, then throw down bloody limbs. He would descend the rope then, and gather up all the bloody limbs and put them in a basket. The boy would then pop out of the basket, very much alive.
There have been several theories over the years of how this trick may have been performed. The first theory was that this was mass hypnosis. The source of this argument was F.S. Elmore in the Chicago Tribune in 1894. But apparently, the account of a crowd being hypnotised was made up. The second theory was that the trick was possible because levitation is possible. That theory of course is satisfactory only to those who believe in levitation. Wiseman quoted us a chapter title from an absurd teach yourself levitation book: "So You Can Fly - Now What?". The third theory was that the trick is a magic trick. After all, stage magicians have included it in performances. That's all very fine for stages with lights and mirrors and so on, but in the open air in India, surrounded by a crowd of people...?
What was the method? The solution was offered by a man named Sorkhar: One performs the trick between two hills. Human hair is tied together and stranded between the two hills. The rope is thrown up until it catches the hair. The boy climbs up the rope. When the fakir climbs up there are shaven monkey limbs under his robe. At the top, the boy climbs into his robe and he throws down the limbs. When he descends and goes to the basket, the boy drops into it. The limbs then go into the basket and the boy pops out. Apart from the Sorkhar theory there is the John Keel theory - that one ties hair between two buildings and uses twin boys, actually killing one of them!
But maybe it is all a myth? The British Magic Circle was convinced that the trick didn't exist and offered five hundred guineas to someone who could perform it. A man named Karachi said he could do it. Harry Price (famous psychic investigator of the 1920's and 30's) filmed Karachi's attempt. Karachi, despite his turban, was not Indian - he was a British performer based in Plymouth. The film was made in a field near Hatfield in Hertfordshire, with some introductory footage made in a garden in Hampstead. In the film the rope goes up and remains erect in the air. The boy (Karachi's son) climbs up. The Magic Circle did not give Karachi the money, though, because the boy did not vanish. They wanted evidence of the miraculous trick they had heard about.
There is more evidence for the trick. There are photos and additional film. There was a 1937 film made at Karachi Barracks in India, and a 1938 Today Magazine photo taken in Bombay described as "a filmic interpretation of the trick". There are other photos that were taken in 1919.
Regarding the 1938 photo, it was of course not genuine, being literally "a filmic interpretation of the trick." As for the 1937 footage - as the rope goes up into the air the onlookers' eyeline is above the rope - what one would expect if the rope was falling. The footage has been reversed! Furthermore, there are a couple of frames where the rope is not there at all. Also, upon further investigation of the film, one can see that there is a pole behind the rope. The footage is obviously a hoax and a barracks in-joke. The 1919 photos, which depict fakirs balancing at the top of erect ropes are actually photos of the Indian pole balancing trick. Nothing paranormal there.
So, no photos and no film. But there are eyewitness accounts. Wiseman searched through all the articles in the newspapers of the period. There were fifty accounts from Britons that had seen the trick performed in India. These fell into five categories. (1) Really unimpressive: the boy climbs up the rope, end of story. (2) The boy vanishes at the top and then reappears. (3) The boy vanishes and doesn't come back. (4) The boy vanishes and reappears somewhere else. (5) The boy vanishes and reappears somewhere that was in full view all the time (like in the basket or in the crowd). There is no account at all in these original articles of the boy being decapitated or severed limb from limb et cetera.
The data was looked at in terms of the lapse in the number of years between the eyewitness seeing the trick and reporting it. With group (1) there was a lapse of a few years. One can add ten years for each of the other categories. The more years, the more impressive the story. What we are looking at is exaggeration over time.
What were the people in group (1) seeing? One of the eyewitnesses from this group provided a photo but that was one of the 1919 pole balancing trick photos taken by Captain Holmes...
The rope trick may have been performed at the same time as the basic basket trick and in memory the two were confused...
But it looks like the case is closed on this one.
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