Diabolo History
The origin of diabolo
According to the information of
Encyclopedia of China,
the inventor of diabolo doesn’t be depicted. But one thing can be certain is
that diabolo has been existing since long ago before the Min Dynasty.
In the Chinese ancient book of Teikyo Features
Slightly, The main part of the diabolo is round and there is an axle made of
bamboo in it. People wind cotton threads around the axle and fling it so the
diabolo will keep rotating because of the centrifugal force.
One of the basic diabolo skills is to throw up the
diabolo into the air and catch it with the cotton threads. The other is to
let the diabolo climb up the pole. And the last one is to throw the diabolo
to your partner.
These basic skills became one of the Chinese
traditional acrobatics gradually.
Modern Diabolo
In the past, due to the difficulty of learning,
diabolo was expensive and its materials were not popular. So, the
development of the diabolo was slow and made it the entertainment of
farmhouses in Northern China. Not until recent years plastic diabolos were
invented, more and more people noticed this folk art. In addition, various
competitions facilitated the learning of diabolo which helped the diabolo
start to boom. The invention of Fly Series is a big landmark. It is
different from the traditional diabolo. It makes the control of the diabolo
much easier in details for some beginners. As to other accessories, wood
sticks are replaced by carbon fiber sticks, cotton string is also replaced
by the nylon string and water string. Different accessories have different
functions for different movements which makes the simple diabolo much more
lively than ever.