THE legendary 18th-century magician Giuseppe Balsamo, the self-styled Count Cagliostro, does not seem to have anything in common with his latest biographer, the Canberra historian Iain McCalman. But when the professor from the Australian National University travelled to Palermo, Sicily to find the birthplace of the conman, alchemist, magician and adventurer, he felt a surprising affinity with the old rogue.

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