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102-580: The words juggling and juggler derive from the Middle English jogelen ("to entertain by performing tricks "), which in turn is from the Old French jangler . There is also the Late Latin form joculare of Latin joculari , meaning "to jest". Although the etymology of the terms juggler and juggling in the sense of manipulating objects for entertainment originates as far back as

204-738: A demonstrative ( þis , þat ), after a possessive pronoun (e.g., hir , our ), or with a name or in a form of address. This derives from the Old English "weak" declension of adjectives. This inflexion continued to be used in writing even after final -e had ceased to be pronounced. In earlier texts, multisyllable adjectives also receive a final -e in these situations, but this occurs less regularly in later Middle English texts. Otherwise, adjectives have no ending and adjectives already ending in -e etymologically receive no ending as well. Earlier texts sometimes inflect adjectives for case as well. Layamon's Brut inflects adjectives for

306-556: A growing focus on juggling competitions . Juggling today has evolved and branched out to the point where it is synonymous with all prop manipulation. The wide variety of the juggling scene can be seen at any juggling convention. Juggling conventions or festivals form the backbone of the juggling scene. The focus of most of these conventions is the main space used for open juggling. There will also be more formal workshops in which expert jugglers will work with small groups on specific skills and techniques. Most juggling conventions also include

408-502: A largely Anglo-Saxon vocabulary (with many Norse borrowings in the northern parts of the country) but a greatly simplified inflectional system. The grammatical relations that were expressed in Old English by the dative and instrumental cases were replaced in Early Middle English with prepositional constructions. The Old English genitive - es survives in the -'s of the modern English possessive , but most of

510-494: A lengthened – and later also modified – pronunciation of a preceding vowel. For example, in name , originally pronounced as two syllables, the /a/ in the first syllable (originally an open syllable) lengthened, the final weak vowel was later dropped, and the remaining long vowel was modified in the Great Vowel Shift (for these sound changes, see Phonology , above). The final ⟨e⟩ , now silent, thus became

612-495: A lesser extent), and, therefore, it cannot be attributed simply to the influence of French-speaking sections of the population: English did, after all, remain the vernacular . It is also argued that Norse immigrants to England had a great impact on the loss of inflectional endings in Middle English. One argument is that, although Norse and English speakers were somewhat comprehensible to each other due to similar morphology,

714-534: A main show (open to the general public), competitions, and juggling games. Juggling can be categorised by various criteria: There is no organisation that tracks all juggling world records. Toss juggling and club passing world records used to be tracked by the Juggling Information Service Committee on Numbers Juggling (JISCON) (now defunct). Some records are tracked by Guinness World Records . Professional jugglers perform in

816-421: A number of different styles, which are not mutually exclusive. These juggling styles have developed or been introduced over time with some becoming more popular at some times than others. Traditional circus-style juggling emphasises high levels of skill and sometimes large-scale props to enable the act to "fill" the circus ring. The juggling act may involve some comedy or other circus skills such as acrobatics, but

918-612: A one-act may become a regular feature at these yearly events. Renaissance fairs in North America and medieval fairs in Europe often book professional jugglers. Other historically themed events such as Victorian, maritime, and large-scale festivals of history such as the one organised by English Heritage regularly employ juggling acts as part of the event. In many countries such as the UK, USA, Australia, Spain, France jugglers perform on

1020-420: A pleasing way." The earliest record of juggling is suggested in a panel from the 15th (1994 to 1781 B.C.) Beni Hasan tomb of an unknown Egyptian prince, showing female dancers and acrobats throwing balls. Juggling has been recorded in many early cultures including Egyptian , Nabataean , Chinese , Indian , Greek , Roman , Norse , Aztec (Mexico) and Polynesian civilizations. Juggling in ancient China

1122-593: A process called apophony ), as in Modern English. With the discontinuation of the Late West Saxon standard used for the writing of Old English in the period prior to the Norman Conquest, Middle English came to be written in a wide variety of scribal forms, reflecting different regional dialects and orthographic conventions. Later in the Middle English period, however, and particularly with

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1224-791: A research study on the effects of sword swallowing was conducted by Dan Meyer of the Sword Swallowers Association International and Dr. Brian Witcombe, consultant radiologist at the Gloucestershire Royal Hospital in Gloucester, England. The results of their research were published in "Sword swallowing and its side effects"' in the December 23, 2006 issue of the British Medical Journal . The paper won

1326-501: A star billing. Circus jugglers come from many countries and include those from Russia and other Eastern European countries, China, Latin America and other European countries. Some of the greatest jugglers from the past 50 years are from Eastern Europe, including Sergej Ignatov , Andrii Kolesnikov , Evgenij Biljauer , and Gregory Popovich . Variety theatres have a long history of including juggling acts on their billing. Vaudeville in

1428-475: A study to determine whether sword swallowing could be used to help patients who suffer from achalasia , or those who had suffered severe throat trauma. Modern sword swallowers include: In 2009, the Guinness World Record for longest sword swallowed was achieved by Natasha Veruschka with a 58 cm (22.83 in) long sword. The Guinness World Record for 'Most swords swallowed underwater'

1530-546: A third distinct type of performance associated with the medieval jongleurs , that of the street performance . Sword swallowing was performed during the Middle Ages as part of street theatre and was popular at festivals and other large gatherings. It began to die out in the mid-19th century and was outlawed in Scandinavia in 1893. Prolific swallower Teodor Olsen famously made an appeal to Haakon VII of Norway , who

1632-426: A time and then twisting all ten swords 180 degrees in his throat. Thomas Blackthorne made the sword known as "The Sword of Swords". It holds the Guinness World Record for the most swallowed sword and has been swallowed by 40 of the world's most known sword swallowers. Wang Lei from Dezhou, China holds the Guinness World Record for most swords swallowed in three minutes (27). [2] In 2023, Heather Holliday became

1734-404: A time regurgitated, allowing Stevens to examine the extent of the digestion that had taken place. In 1906, a doctor named Cremer performed an electrocardiogram by passing an electrode down the esophagus of a sword swallower. This approach has since been proven useful by numerous studies; esophageal recording at a location in proximity to the heart improves signal detection. From 2003 to 2006,

1836-401: A unicycle' (3 swords swallowed on a 3m tall unicycle) and 'Longest lightning bolt to strike swallowed sword'. The measured distance the stream of electrical discharge traveled from Australia's largest Tesla Coil, owned and operated by Peter Terren (AKA: Dr Electric), to the handle of Chayne's swallowed sword was 3 feet 10 inches. The sword blade measured 62 cm and was swallowed all the way to

1938-524: A variant of the Northumbrian dialect (prevalent in northern England and spoken in southeast Scotland ). During the Middle English period, many Old English grammatical features either became simplified or disappeared altogether. Noun, adjective, and verb inflections were simplified by the reduction (and eventual elimination) of most grammatical case distinctions. Middle English also saw considerable adoption of Anglo-Norman vocabulary, especially in

2040-488: A written form and in normal conversations among jugglers. Siteswap is by far the most common juggling notation. Various heights of throw, considered to take specific "beats" of time to complete, are assigned a relative number. From those, a pattern is conveyed as a sequence of numbers, such as "3", "744", or "97531". Those examples are for two hands making alternating or "asynchronous" throws, and often called vanilla siteswap . For showing patterns in which both hands throw at

2142-401: Is b and the average of the numbers in a siteswap pattern equal the number of balls required for the pattern. For example, the number of three digit three ball patterns is 3 = 27, and the box, (4,2x)(2x,4), requires (4+2+4+2)/4 = 3 balls. "The time that a ball spends in flight is proportional to the square root of the height of the throw," meaning that the number of balls used greatly increases

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2244-715: Is 5 and was achieved at the Aquarium of the Smokies on February 13, 2016 by Chris Steele. He was also the first person to swallow a sword underwater on May 9, 2006 at Manly Ocean World Aquarium in Sydney Australia. He performed this underwater feat in a tank of live sharks. Chayne Hultgren (a.k.a. The Space Cowboy) also holds the most official 'Guinness World Record' for sword swallowing including 'Most swords swallowed at once' (24 swords), 'Most swords swallowed while juggling' (18 swords), 'Most swords swallowed while riding

2346-725: Is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman Conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English period. Scholarly opinion varies, but the University of Valencia states the period when Middle English was spoken as being from 1150 to 1500. This stage of the development of the English language roughly coincided with

2448-433: Is now rare and used only in oxen and as part of a double plural , in children and brethren . Some dialects still have forms such as eyen (for eyes ), shoon (for shoes ), hosen (for hose(s) ), kine (for cows ), and been (for bees ). Grammatical gender survived to a limited extent in early Middle English before being replaced by natural gender in the course of the Middle English period. Grammatical gender

2550-544: Is required to complete the process without injury, as the sword passes within millimetres of vital body parts such as the aorta, heart and lungs. Most serious sword swallowing injuries and fatalities occur after minor injuries or while attempting a feat beyond that of a normal sword swallow. The most common injury is a sore throat when first learning, after frequent consecutive performances, or after swallowing curved swords or several swords at once. Swallowing multiple swords simultaneously over time can also lead to distension of

2652-524: The Augustinian canon Orrm wrote the Ormulum , one of the oldest surviving texts in Middle English. The influence of Old Norse aided the development of English from a synthetic language with relatively free word order to a more analytic language with a stricter word order. Both Old English and Old Norse were synthetic languages with complicated inflections. Communication between Vikings in

2754-597: The Danelaw and their Anglo-Saxon neighbours resulted in the erosion of inflection in both languages. Old Norse may have had a more profound impact on Middle and Modern English development than any other language. The effect of Old Norse on Old English was substantive, pervasive, and of a democratic character. Like close cousins, Old Norse and Old English resembled each other, and with some words and grammatical structures in common, speakers of each language roughly understood each other, but according to historian Simeon Potler

2856-616: The Early Modern English and Modern English eras. Middle English generally did not have silent letters . For example, knight was pronounced [ˈkniçt] (with both the ⟨k⟩ and the ⟨gh⟩ pronounced, the latter sounding as the ⟨ch⟩ in German Knecht ). The major exception was the silent ⟨e⟩ – originally pronounced but lost in normal speech by Chaucer's time. This letter, however, came to indicate

2958-476: The High and Late Middle Ages . Middle English saw significant changes to its vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and orthography . Writing conventions during the Middle English period varied widely. Examples of writing from this period that have survived show extensive regional variation. The more standardized Old English literary variety broke down and writing in English became fragmented and localized and was, for

3060-585: The Norman Conquest , had normally been written in French. Like Chaucer's work, this new standard was based on the East Midlands-influenced speech of London. Clerks using this standard were usually familiar with French and Latin , influencing the forms they chose. The Chancery Standard, which was adopted slowly, was used in England by bureaucrats for most official purposes, excluding those of

3162-417: The pharynx and esophageal sphincter , the sword passes swiftly, assisted by gravity, straightening the flexible esophagus. The stomach, at an angle to the esophagus, is brought into line as the sword enters through the cardiac opening. Some swallowers consume a large meal or drink water before performing to give the stomach a more vertical orientation, allowing for easier passage of the sword. Careful focus

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3264-428: The 11th century, the current sense of to juggle , meaning "to continually toss objects in the air and catch them", originates from the late 19th century. From the 12th to the 17th century, juggling and juggler were the terms most consistently used to describe acts of magic , though some have called the term juggling a lexicographical nightmare, stating that it is one of the least understood relating to magic. In

3366-645: The 12th century, incorporating a unique phonetic spelling system; and the Ancrene Wisse and the Katherine Group , religious texts written for anchoresses , apparently in the West Midlands in the early 13th century. The language found in the last two works is sometimes called the AB language . Additional literary sources of the 12th and 13th centuries include Layamon's Brut and The Owl and

3468-422: The 13th century and was replaced by thorn. Thorn mostly fell out of use during the 14th century and was replaced by ⟨th⟩ . Anachronistic usage of the scribal abbreviation [REDACTED] ( þe , "the") has led to the modern mispronunciation of thorn as ⟨ y ⟩ in this context; see ye olde . Wynn, which represented the phoneme /w/ , was replaced by ⟨ w ⟩ during

3570-409: The 13th century. Due to its similarity to the letter ⟨p⟩ , it is mostly represented by ⟨w⟩ in modern editions of Old and Middle English texts even when the manuscript has wynn. Under Norman influence, the continental Carolingian minuscule replaced the insular script that had been used for Old English. However, because of the significant difference in appearance between

3672-473: The 14th century, even after the loss of the majority of the continental possessions of the English monarchy . In the aftermath of the Black Death of the 14th century, there was significant migration into London , of people to the counties of the southeast of England and from the east and central Midlands of England, and a new prestige London dialect began to develop as a result of this clash of

3774-604: The 1540s after the printing and wide distribution of the English Bible and Prayer Book , which made the new standard of English publicly recognizable and lasted until about 1650. The main changes between the Old English sound system and that of Middle English include: The combination of the last three processes listed above led to the spelling conventions associated with silent ⟨e⟩ and doubled consonants (see under Orthography , below). Middle English retains only two distinct noun-ending patterns from

3876-694: The 17th, the founding date of the International Jugglers' Association. Most cities and large towns now have juggling clubs. These are often based within, or connected to, universities and colleges. There are also community circus groups that teach young people and put on shows. The Juggling Edge maintains a searchable database of most juggling clubs. Since the 1980s, a juggling culture has developed. The scene revolves around local clubs and organizations, special events, shows, magazines, web sites, internet forums and, possibly most importantly, juggling conventions . In recent years, there has also been

3978-447: The 1890s a small number of sword swallowers performed in the UK, such as Martha Mitchell (c. 1855) and Benedetti (1863–1895), and in the US, including Lawson Peck (c. 1850s), Ling Look (c. 1872), Wandana (d. 1875), and Harry Parsons (d. 1880). The best-known North American sword swallower of this time was Fred McLone, better known to the public as "Chevalier Cliquot", who performed from 1878 to

4080-671: The 21st century, the term juggling usually refers to toss juggling , where objects are continuously thrown into the air and caught again, repeating in a rhythmical pattern. According to James Ernest in his book Contact Juggling , most people will describe juggling as "throwing and catching things"; however, a juggler might describe the act as "a visually complex or physically challenging feat using one or more objects". David Levinson and Karen Christensen describe juggling as "the sport of tossing and catching or manipulating objects [...] keeping them in constant motion". "Juggling, like music , combines abstract patterns and mind-body coordination in

4182-572: The Church and legalities, which used Latin and Law French respectively. The Chancery Standard's influence on later forms of written English is disputed, but it did undoubtedly provide the core around which Early Modern English formed. Early Modern English emerged with the help of William Caxton 's printing press, developed during the 1470s. The press stabilized English through a push towards standardization, led by Chancery Standard enthusiast and writer Richard Pynson . Early Modern English began in

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4284-557: The Nightingale . Some scholars have defined "Early Middle English" as encompassing English texts up to 1350. This longer time frame would extend the corpus to include many Middle English Romances (especially those of the Auchinleck manuscript c.  1330 ). Gradually, the wealthy and the government Anglicised again, although Norman (and subsequently French ) remained the dominant language of literature and law until

4386-591: The Norse speakers' inability to reproduce the ending sounds of English words influenced Middle English's loss of inflectional endings. Important texts for the reconstruction of the evolution of Middle English out of Old English are the Peterborough Chronicle , which continued to be compiled up to 1154; the Ormulum , a biblical commentary probably composed in Lincolnshire in the second half of

4488-544: The Old English -eþ , Midland dialects showing -en from about 1200, and Northern forms using -es in the third person singular as well as the plural. The past tense of weak verbs was formed by adding an -ed(e) , -d(e) , or -t(e) ending. The past-tense forms, without their personal endings, also served as past participles with past-participle prefixes derived from Old English: i- , y- , and sometimes bi- . Strong verbs , by contrast, formed their past tense by changing their stem vowel (e.g., binden became bound ,

4590-713: The Old Norse influence was strongest in the dialects under Danish control that composed the southern part of the Northern England (corresponding to the Scandinavian Kingdom of Jórvík ), the East Midlands and the East of England , words in the spoken language emerged in the 10th and 11th centuries near the transition from Old to Middle English. Influence on the written languages only appeared from

4692-551: The USA and Music halls in the UK regularly featured jugglers during the heyday of variety theatre in the first half of 20th century. Variety theatre has declined in popularity but is still present in many European countries, particularly Germany. Television talent shows have introduced juggling acts to a wider audience with the newest examples being Britain's Got Talent and America's Got Talent. In North America jugglers have often performed in casinos , in places like Las Vegas. Germany and

4794-565: The United States have produced some of the greatest jugglers from the past 50 years, most notably Francis Brunn from Germany and Anthony Gatto from the United States. There is a wide variety of festivals and fairs where juggling acts are sometimes booked to perform. Music, food and arts festivals have all booked professional performers. The festivals can range from very large scale events such as Glastonbury Festival to small town or village fairs. The acts may differ from year to year or

4896-710: The abundance of Modern English words for the mechanisms of government that are derived from Anglo-Norman, such as court , judge , jury , appeal , and parliament . There are also many Norman-derived terms relating to the chivalric cultures that arose in the 12th century, an era of feudalism , seigneurialism , and crusading . Words were often taken from Latin, usually through French transmission. This gave rise to various synonyms, including kingly (inherited from Old English), royal (from French, inherited from Vulgar Latin), and regal (from French, which borrowed it from Classical Latin). Later French appropriations were derived from standard, rather than Norman, French. Examples of

4998-577: The air and in the hands: (F+D)H=(V+D)N , where F = time a ball spends in the air, D = time a ball spends in a hand/time a hand is full, V = time a hand is vacant, N = number of balls, and H = number of hands. For example, a hand's and a ball's perspectives in the two-hand ( H ) three-ball ( N ) cascade pattern: Juggling tricks and patterns can become very complex, and hence can be difficult to communicate to others. Therefore, notation systems have been developed for specifying patterns, as well as for discovering new patterns. Diagram-based notations are

5100-404: The amount of speed or height required, which increases the need for accuracy between the direction and synchronization of throws. Coupled oscillation and synchronization ("the tendency of two limbs to move at the same frequency ") appear to be easier in all patterns and also required by certain patterns. For example, "the fountain pattern...can be stably performed in two ways...one can perform

5202-514: The annual conventions. The IJA continues to hold an annual convention each summer and runs a number of other programs dedicated to advance the art of juggling worldwide. World Juggling Day was created as an annual day of recognition for the hobby, with the intent to teach people how to juggle, to promote juggling and to get jugglers together and celebrate. It is held on the Saturday in June closest to

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5304-494: The areas of politics, law, the arts, and religion, as well as poetic and emotive diction. Conventional English vocabulary remained primarily Germanic in its sources, with Old Norse influences becoming more apparent. Significant changes in pronunciation took place, particularly involving long vowels and diphthongs, which in the later Middle English period began to undergo the Great Vowel Shift . Little survives of early Middle English literature , due in part to Norman domination and

5406-583: The beginning of the 13th century, this delay in Scandinavian lexical influence in English has been attributed to the lack of written evidence from the areas of Danish control, as the majority of written sources from Old English were produced in the West Saxon dialect spoken in Wessex , the heart of Anglo-Saxon political power at the time. The Norman Conquest of England in 1066 saw the replacement of

5508-459: The clearest way to show juggling patterns on paper, but as they are based on images, their use is limited in text-based communication. Ladder diagrams track the path of all the props through time, where the less complicated causal diagrams only track the props that are in the air, and assumes that a juggler has a prop in each hand. Numeric notation systems are more popular and standardized than diagram-based notations. They are used extensively in both

5610-414: The clergy for written communication and record-keeping. A significant number of Norman words were borrowed into English and used alongside native Germanic words with similar meanings. Examples of Norman/Germanic pairs in Modern English include pig and pork , calf and veal , wood and forest , and freedom and liberty . The role of Anglo-Norman as the language of government and law can be seen in

5712-507: The comparative and superlative (e.g., greet , great; gretter , greater). Adjectives ending in -ly or -lich formed comparatives either with -lier , -liest or -loker , -lokest . A few adjectives also displayed Germanic umlaut in their comparatives and superlatives, such as long , lenger . Other irregular forms were mostly the same as in modern English. Middle English personal pronouns were mostly developed from those of Old English , with

5814-511: The curtain while sets were changed. Performers started specializing in juggling, separating it from other kinds of performance such as sword swallowing and magic . The Gentleman Juggler style was established by German jugglers such as Salerno and Kara . Rubber processing developed, and jugglers started using rubber balls. Previously, juggling balls were made from balls of twine , stuffed leather bags, wooden spheres, or various metals. Solid or inflatable rubber balls meant that bounce juggling

5916-511: The development and advancement of upper endoscopy. In 1868, Adolf Kussmaul of Freiburg, Germany, performed an esophagoscopy on a sword-swallower using a rigid 47 cm tube, mirrors, and a gasoline lamp. The apparatus, an early endoscope, allowed him to examine the esophagus and the fundus of the stomach. In 1897, a Scottish physician named Stevens performed digestive experiments with a sword swallower assistant. Small metal tubes, pierced with holes and filled with meat, were swallowed and after

6018-486: The development of the Chancery Standard in the 15th century, orthography became relatively standardised in a form based on the East Midlands-influenced speech of London. Spelling at the time was mostly quite regular . (There was a fairly consistent correspondence between letters and sounds.) The irregularity of present-day English orthography is largely due to pronunciation changes that have taken place over

6120-495: The different dialects, that was based chiefly on the speech of the East Midlands but also influenced by that of other regions. The writing of this period, however, continues to reflect a variety of regional forms of English. The Ayenbite of Inwyt , a translation of a French confessional prose work, completed in 1340, is written in a Kentish dialect . The best known writer of Middle English, Geoffrey Chaucer , wrote in

6222-531: The double consonant represented a sound that was (or had previously been) geminated (i.e., had genuinely been "doubled" and would thus have regularly blocked the lengthening of the preceding vowel). In other cases, by analogy, the consonant was written double merely to indicate the lack of lengthening. The basic Old English Latin alphabet consisted of 20 standard letters plus four additional letters: ash ⟨æ⟩ , eth ⟨ð⟩ , thorn ⟨þ⟩ , and wynn ⟨ƿ⟩ . There

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6324-603: The early 20th century. In 1893, sword swallowing was featured at the World Columbian Exposition at the Chicago World's Fair. In the early 1900s, traveling circuses and sideshows featured sword swallowers. In Europe performers tried to swallow large numbers of swords; in America there was a focus on the novel and bizarre. Some tried to swallow longer swords, many swords, hot swords, bayonets or glowing neon tubes . Sword swallowers appeared on

6426-595: The early years of TV, when variety-style programming was popular, jugglers were often featured; but developing a new act for each new show, week after week, was more difficult for jugglers than other types of entertainers; comedians and musicians can pay others to write their material, but jugglers cannot get other people to learn new skills on their behalf. The International Jugglers' Association , founded in 1947, began as an association for professional vaudeville jugglers, but restrictions for membership were eventually changed, and non-performers were permitted to join and attend

6528-468: The end of the Middle English period only the strong -'s ending (variously spelled) was in use. Some formerly feminine nouns, as well as some weak nouns, continued to make their genitive forms with -e or no ending (e.g., fole hoves , horses' hooves), and nouns of relationship ending in -er frequently have no genitive ending (e.g., fader bone , "father's bane"). The strong -(e)s plural form has survived into Modern English. The weak -(e)n form

6630-437: The esophagus. A minor injury may predispose the performer to sustaining a more major one, including perforation of the esophagus, stomach , heart, lungs, and other organs in proximity to the path of the sword, or intestinal bleeding. Twenty-nine deaths have been reported as a result of sword swallowing injuries since 1880. The abilities of sword-swallowers have proven useful to the progress of medical knowledge, specifically in

6732-418: The exception of the third person plural, a borrowing from Old Norse (the original Old English form clashed with the third person singular and was eventually dropped). Also, the nominative form of the feminine third person singular was replaced by a form of the demonstrative that developed into sche (modern she ), but the alternative heyr remained in some areas for a long time. As with nouns, there

6834-399: The fact that the micro-gravity environment of orbit deprives the juggled objects of the essential ability to fall. This was accomplished initially by Don Williams , as part of a Houston scientist's "Toys In Space" project, with apples and oranges. Two person juggling passing multiple objects between them was first accomplished in space by Greg Chamitoff and Richard Garriott while Garriott

6936-515: The first modern circus . A few years later, he employed jugglers to perform acts along with the horse and clown acts. Since then, jugglers have been associated with circuses. In the early 19th century, troupes from Asia, such as the famous "Indian Jugglers" referred to by William Hazlitt , arrived to tour Britain, Europe and parts of America. In the 19th century, variety and music hall theatres became more popular, and jugglers were in demand to fill time between music acts, performing in front of

7038-415: The fountain with different frequencies for the two hands, but that coordination is difficult because of the tendency of the limbs to synchronize," while "in the cascade...the crossing of the balls between the hands demands that one hand catches at the same rate that the other hand throws." Claude Shannon , builder of the first juggling robot , developed a juggling theorem , relating the time balls spend in

7140-432: The head back, hyper-extending the neck, and relax the upper esophageal sphincter (a generally involuntary muscle that contracts the top of the esophagus ). Retching must be controlled while the sword, lubricated by saliva, is inserted through the mouth and past the pharynx. According to a study on 8 "normal subjects", the transverse diameter of the pharynx at its smallest point is on average 1.7±0.5 cm. Once past

7242-471: The hilt on April 20, 2013, at Perth, WA, Australia. As of July 2016 The Space Cowboy currently holds 44 official Guinness World Records . He is Australia's most prolific record breaker. In 2017, the Guinness World Record for "Largest Curve in a Sword Swallowed" was achieved by Franz Huber with a 133 degree curved sword. Brad Byers holds the Guinness World Record for "The Most Swords Swallowed and Twisted at One Time" by swallowing ten 27 inch swords one at

7344-412: The indicator of the longer and changed pronunciation of ⟨a⟩ . In fact, vowels could have this lengthened and modified pronunciation in various positions, particularly before a single consonant letter and another vowel or before certain pairs of consonants. A related convention involved the doubling of consonant letters to show that the preceding vowel was not to be lengthened. In some cases,

7446-561: The main difference lied on their inflectional endings, which led to much confusion within the mixed population that existed in the Danelaw, this endings tended gradually to become obscured and finally lost, "simplifying English grammar" in the process. In time, the inflections melted away and the analytic pattern emerged. Viking influence on Old English is most apparent in pronouns , modals, comparatives, pronominal adverbs (like hence and together ), conjunctions, and prepositions show

7548-417: The masculine accusative, genitive, and dative, the feminine dative, and the plural genitive. The Owl and the Nightingale adds a final -e to all adjectives not in the nominative, here only inflecting adjectives in the weak declension (as described above). Comparatives and superlatives were usually formed by adding -er and -est . Adjectives with long vowels sometimes shortened these vowels in

7650-427: The more complex system of inflection in Old English : Nouns of the weak declension are primarily inherited from Old English n -stem nouns but also from ō -stem, wō -stem, and u -stem nouns, which did not inflect in the same way as n -stem nouns in Old English, but joined the weak declension in Middle English. Nouns of the strong declension are inherited from the other Old English noun stem classes. Some nouns of

7752-430: The most marked Danish influence. The best evidence of Scandinavian influence appears in extensive word borrowings; however, texts from the period in Scandinavia and Northern England do not provide certain evidence of an influence on syntax. However, at least one scholarly study of this influence shows that Old English may have been replaced entirely by Norse, by virtue of the change from Old English to Norse syntax. While

7854-551: The most part, being improvised. By the end of the period (about 1470), and aided by the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg in 1439, a standard based on the London dialects (Chancery Standard) had become established. This largely formed the basis for Modern English spelling, although pronunciation has changed considerably since that time. Middle English was succeeded in England by Early Modern English , which lasted until about 1650. Scots developed concurrently from

7956-693: The old insular g and the Carolingian g (modern g ), the former continued in use as a separate letter, known as yogh , written ⟨ȝ⟩ . This was adopted for use to represent a variety of sounds: [ɣ], [j], [dʒ], [x], [ç] , while the Carolingian g was normally used for [g]. Instances of yogh were eventually replaced by ⟨j⟩ or ⟨y⟩ and by ⟨gh⟩ in words like night and laugh . In Middle Scots , yogh became indistinguishable from cursive z , and printers tended to use ⟨z⟩ when yogh

8058-423: The other case endings disappeared in the Early Middle English period, including most of the roughly one dozen forms of the definite article ("the"). The dual personal pronouns (denoting exactly two) also disappeared from English during this period. The loss of case endings was part of a general trend from inflections to fixed word order that also occurred in other Germanic languages (though more slowly and to

8160-483: The passage from the mouth to the stomach open for the sword. The practice is dangerous and there is risk of injury or death. Sword swallowing spread to Greece and Rome in the 1st century AD and to China in the 8th century. In Japan , it became a part of the Japanese acrobatic theatre, Sangaku , which included fire eating , tightrope walking , juggling and early illusion . In Europe , it developed into yet

8262-403: The prestige that came with writing in French rather than English. During the 14th century, a new style of literature emerged with the works of writers including John Wycliffe and Geoffrey Chaucer , whose Canterbury Tales remains the most studied and read work of the period. The transition from Late Old English to Early Middle English had taken place by the 1150s to 1180s, the period when

8364-515: The principal focus is the technical skill of the jugglers. Costumes are usually colourful with sequins. Variations within this style include the traditions from Chinese and Russian circus. Comedy juggling acts vary greatly in their skill level, prop use and costuming. However, they all share the fact that the focus of the performance is comedic rather than a demonstration of technical juggling skill. Comedy juggling acts are most commonly seen in street performance, festivals and fairs. Gentleman juggling

8466-569: The resulting doublet pairs include warden (from Norman) and guardian (from later French; both share a common ancestor loaned from Germanic). The end of Anglo-Saxon rule did not result in immediate changes to the language. The general population would have spoken the same dialects as they had before the Conquest. Once the writing of Old English came to an end, Middle English had no standard language, only dialects that evolved individually from Old English. Early Middle English (1150–1350) has

8568-517: The same bill as magicians, such as Houdini . Western Europe and England also saw an increase in sword swallowing interest during this period, with many cross-Atlantic influences. During the late 19th century and early 20th century, traveling magic shows from the Orient toured Europe and America; some included sword swallowing. The middle of the 20th century saw a demise in circuses in general and sideshows in particular. The performer must first lean

8670-436: The same time, there are other notating conventions for synchronous siteswap. There is also multiplex siteswap for patterns where one hand holds or throws two or more balls on the same beat. Other extensions to siteswap have been developed, including passing siteswap, Multi-Hand Notation (MHN), and General Siteswap (GS). Organizations Resources Other Middle English Middle English (abbreviated to ME )

8772-807: The second half of the 14th century in the emerging London dialect, although he also portrays some of his characters as speaking in northern dialects, as in " The Reeve's Tale ". In the English-speaking areas of lowland Scotland , an independent standard was developing, based on the Northumbrian dialect . This would develop into what came to be known as the Scots language . A large number of terms for abstract concepts were adopted directly from scholastic philosophical Latin (rather than via French). Examples are "absolute", "act", "demonstration", and "probable". The Chancery Standard of written English emerged c.  1430 in official documents that, since

8874-458: The second person singular in -(e)st (e.g., þou spekest , "thou speakest"), and the third person singular in -eþ (e.g., he comeþ , "he cometh/he comes"). ( þ (the letter "thorn") is pronounced like the unvoiced th in "think", but under certain circumstances, it may be like the voiced th in "that"). The following table illustrates a typical conjugation pattern: Plural forms vary strongly by dialect, with Southern dialects preserving

8976-972: The street ( busking ). Street juggling acts usually perform what is known as a circle show and collect money at the end of the performance in a hat or bottle . Most street jugglers perform comedy juggling acts. Well known locations for this kind of street performance include Covent Garden in London, Faneuil Hall in Boston, Outside the Pump Rooms in Bath, Prince's Street in Edinburgh, outside the Pompidou Centre in Paris, Circular Quay in Sydney, and Pearl Street in Boulder. Juggling has been performed in space despite

9078-409: The strong type have an -e in the nominative/accusative singular, like the weak declension, but otherwise strong endings. Often, these are the same nouns that had an -e in the nominative/accusative singular of Old English (they, in turn, were inherited from Proto-Germanic ja -stem and i -stem nouns). The distinct dative case was lost in early Middle English, and although the genitive survived, by

9180-637: The team the 2007 Ig Nobel Prize in Medicine at Harvard. In January 2006, Dan Meyer worked with physicians and researchers in swallowing disorders at Vanderbilt Stallworth Rehabilitation Center at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville , Tennessee to explore whether the techniques involved in sword swallowing could be used to help patients who suffer from swallowing disorders such as dysphagia or achalasia . In 2007, Dai Andrews worked with Dr. Sharon Caplan at Johns Hopkins University on

9282-440: The top levels of the English-speaking political and ecclesiastical hierarchies by Norman rulers who spoke a dialect of Old French , now known as Old Norman , which developed in England into Anglo-Norman . The use of Norman as the preferred language of literature and polite discourse fundamentally altered the role of Old English in education and administration, even though many Normans of this period were illiterate and depended on

9384-557: The type of performers who juggled, called gleemen , accusing them of base morals or even practicing witchcraft . Jugglers in this era would only perform in marketplaces , streets, fairs, or drinking houses. They would perform short, humorous and bawdy acts and pass a hat or bag among the audience for tips. Some kings' and noblemen's bards , fools, or jesters would have been able to juggle or perform acrobatics , though their main skills would have been oral ( poetry , music , comedy and storytelling ). In 1768, Philip Astley opened

9486-528: Was an art performed by some warriors. One such warrior was Xiong Yiliao, whose juggling of nine balls in front of troops on a battlefield reportedly caused the opposing troops to flee without fighting, resulting in a complete victory. In Europe, juggling was an acceptable diversion until the decline of the Roman Empire , after which the activity fell into disgrace. Throughout the Middle Ages , most histories were written by religious clerics who frowned upon

9588-425: Was indicated by agreement of articles and pronouns (e.g., þo ule "the feminine owl") or using the pronoun he to refer to masculine nouns such as helm ("helmet"), or phrases such as scaft stærcne (strong shaft), with the masculine accusative adjective ending -ne . Single-syllable adjectives added -e when modifying a noun in the plural and when used after the definite article ( þe ), after

9690-565: Was not available in their fonts; this led to new spellings (often giving rise to new pronunciations), as in McKenzie , where the ⟨z⟩ replaced a yogh, which had the pronunciation /j/ . Sword swallowing Sword swallowing is a skill in which the performer passes a sword through the mouth and down the esophagus to the stomach . This feat is not swallowing in the traditional sense. The natural processes that constitute swallowing do not take place, but are repressed to keep

9792-745: Was not swayed by his performance enough to rescind the ban. According to an early 19th-century English magazine article the abilities of sword-swallowers in India were considered incredible when first reported in England. In 1813 'swallowing the sword' was advertised as among the new and astonishing feats performed by the Indian Jugglers then appearing in London. The troupe was led by the famous juggler and sword swallower Ramo Samee, who continued to perform until his death in London in August 1850, having at times also toured Europe and America. From 1850 to

9894-520: Was not yet a distinct j , v , or w , and Old English scribes did not generally use k , q , or z . Ash was no longer required in Middle English, as the Old English vowel /æ/ that it represented had merged into /a/ . The symbol nonetheless came to be used as a ligature for the digraph ⟨ae⟩ in many words of Greek or Latin origin, as did ⟨œ⟩ for ⟨oe⟩ . Eth and thorn both represented /θ/ or its allophone / ð / in Old English. Eth fell out of use during

9996-417: Was ousted by it in most dialects by the 15th. The following table shows some of the various Middle English pronouns. Many other variations are noted in Middle English sources because of differences in spellings and pronunciations at different times and in different dialects. As a general rule, the indicative first person singular of verbs in the present tense ended in -e (e.g., ich here , "I hear"),

10098-701: Was popular in variety theatres and usually involves juggling some of the elements of a gentleman's attire, namely hats, canes, gloves, cigars, and other everyday items such as plates and wine bottles . The style is often sophisticated and visual rather than comedic, though it has been interpreted in many different styles. French juggler Gaston Palmer , for example, gained a kind of notoriety for his comedic execution of gentleman juggling tricks. Jugglers perform themed acts, sometimes with specifically themed props and usually in themed costumes. Examples include jesters, pirates, sports, Victorians and chefs. Jugglers commonly feature in circuses, with many performers having enjoyed

10200-469: Was possible. Inflated rubber balls made ball spinning easier and more readily accessible. Soon in North America, vaudeville theatres employed jugglers, often hiring European performers. In the early to mid-20th century, variety and vaudeville shows decreased in popularity due to competition from motion picture theatres, radio and television , and juggling suffered as a result. Music and comedy transferred very easily to radio, but juggling could not. In

10302-475: Was some inflectional simplification (the distinct Old English dual forms were lost), but pronouns, unlike nouns, retained distinct nominative and accusative forms. Third person pronouns also retained a distinction between accusative and dative forms, but that was gradually lost: The masculine hine was replaced by him south of the River Thames by the early 14th century, and the neuter dative him

10404-788: Was visiting the International Space Station as a Spaceflight Participant in October 2008. Their juggling of objects while in orbit was featured in Apogee of Fear , the first science fiction movie made in space by Garriott and 'Zero-G Magic', a magic show also recorded in space by Chamitoff and Garriott at that time. According to an Oxford University study, juggling improves cerebral connectivity performance. Mathematics has been used to understand juggling as juggling has been used to test mathematics. The number of possible patterns n digits long using b or fewer balls

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