Sources page biographical material

6.BJ. 3D DISSECTION PUZZLES
This will cover a number of cases which are not very mathematical. I will record just some early examples. See also 6.G (esp. 6.G.1), 6.N, 6.W (esp. 6.W.7), 6.AP for special cases. The predecessors of these puzzles seem to be the binomial and trinomial cubes showing (a+b)³ and (a+b+c)³, which I have placed in 6.G.1. Cube dissections with cuts at angles to the faces were common in the 19C Chinese puzzle chests, often in ivory. I have only just started to notice these. It is hard to distinguish items in this section from other burr puzzles, 6.W.7, and I have tried to avoid repetition, so one must also look at that section when looking at this section.
Catel. Kunst-Cabinet. 1790. Der Vexierwürfel, p. 11 & fig. 32 on plate II. Figure shows that there are some cuts at angles to the faces, so this is not an ordinary cube dissection, but is more like the 19C Chinese dissected cubes.

C. Baudenbecher. Sample book or catalogue from c1850s. Op. cit. in 6.W.7. One whole folio page shows about 20 types of wooden interlocking puzzles, including most of the types mentioned in this section and in 6.W.5 and 6.W.7. Until I get a picture, I can't be more specific.

Slocum. Compendium. Shows: Wonderful "Coffee Pot"; Magic "Apple"; Magic "Pear"; Extraordinary "Cube"; Magic "Tub" from Mr. Bland's Illustrated Catalogue of Extraordinary and Superior Conjuring Tricks, etc.; Joseph Bland, London, c1890. He shows further examples from 1915 onward.

Hoffmann. 1893. Chap. II, pp. 107-108 & 141-142 = Hoffmann-Hordern, pp. 106-107, with photo.

No. 37: The Fairy Tea-Table. Photo on p. 107 shows a German example, 1870-1895.

No. 38: The Mystery. Photo on p. 107 shows a German example, 1870-1895, with instructions.

Western Puzzle Works, 1926 Catalogue.

No. 5075. Unnamed -- Fairy Tea-Table.

Last page shows 20 Chinese Wood Block Puzzles, High Grade. These are unnamed, but the shapes include various burr-like objects, cube, spheres, egg, barrel, tankard, pear and apple.

P. M. Grundy. A three-dimensional jig-saw. Eureka 7 (Mar 1942) 8-10. Consider a 2 x 2 x 2 array of unit cubes. He suggests removing and/or adding lumps on the interior faces to make a jig-saw. He then considers lumps in the form of a isosceles right triangular prism with largest face being a unit square. He finds there are 25 such pieces, subject to the conditions that there are most two removals, and that when there are two, they must be parallel. He gives a graphical view of a 2 x 2 x 2 formed from such pieces which gives some necessary, but not sufficient, conditions for a set of eight such pieces to be able to make a cube. One solution is shown. [If one assumes there is just one removal and one addition, I find just four pieces, which form a 1 x 2 x 2 block. One could view this as a 3-dimensional matching puzzle, where the internal faces have to match both like a head to tail matching, but also with correct orientation. MacMahon thought of notching pieces as an alternative to colouring edges, but his pieces were two-dimensional.]