In this sequence, cards are turned over on top of the deck with a diminishing impromptu double backer made of secretly reversed cards. The term has also been applied to All Alike displays with small packets; for this display see Multiple Lift Display Sequence.
Edward Marlo published a precursor for this idea in “General Ace Trick”, Pasteboard Presto, 1938, p. 9. There, a type of Diminishing Lift sequence is done without reversed cards in the deck. A series of Multiple Lifts of decreasing size is done on top of the deck to show four apparent duplicates of the same Ace while switching in three other Aces. Marlo later published the Diminishing Lift Sequence, using secretly reversed cards and Multiple Turnovers to switch cards, creating a better illusion, in Ibidem, No. 21, June 1960, p. 10. Marlo's notation dates it as August 23, 1959. In Ibidem, No. 22, Oct. 1960, p. 472-478, Marlo contributes other tricks using the diminishing lift sequence, which he dates back to 1953 and 1955.