Dance Until We Actually Drop? The Dancing Plagues (Episode #50)

Mysterious Pals

The Dancing Plagues were a bizarre phenomenon that swept through Europe during the Middle Ages, where groups of people engaged in frenzied, uncontrollable dancing, often to the point of exhaustion or even death. These outbreaks varied in size, with some involving dozens of participants and some possibly having hundreds. Some theories range from demonic possession and divine punishment to mass hysteria and poisoning. So what really caused these strange events?

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• Theme Music by Dethlehem (dethlehem.bandcamp.com)

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EPISODE RESOURCES

• ‌Baklarz, Cat. “Dancing towards Death: What Historians Know about Choreomania, and the Cultural Meanings of Dancing Plagues in Early Modern Europe | Exploring History.” Medium, Exploring History, 8 June 2022, medium.com/exploring-history/dancing-towards-death-what-historians-know-about-choreomania-and-the-cultural-meanings-of-dancing-33a25ba5270#:~:text=They%2520looked%2520back%2520to%2520the%2520first%2520dancing.
• D’Amato, Lee. “The ‘Dancing Plague’ of 1518.” Explorethearchive.com, 14 Apr. 2022, explorethearchive.com/dancing-plague
• ‌Davis, Matt. “The Bizarre Story of the Deadly ‘Dancing Plague’ of 1518.” Big Think, 14 July 2023, bigthink.com/the-past/dancing-plague-middle-ages/
• ‌Fessenden, Marissa. “A Strange Case of Dancing Mania Struck Germany Six Centuries Ago Today.” Smithsonian, Smithsonian.com, 24 June 2016, www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/strange-case-dancing-mania-struck-germany-six-centuries-ago-today-180959549/
• ‌Jana, Rosalind. “The People Who ‘Danced Themselves to Death.’” Www.bbc.com, 12 May 2022, www.bbc.com/culture/article/20220512-the-people-who-danced-themselves-to-death.
• ‌Miller, Lynneth J. “Divine Punishment or Disease? Medieval and Early Modern Approaches to the 1518 Strasbourg Dancing Plague.” Dance Research, vol. 35, no. 2, Nov. 2017, pp. 149–64, https://doi.org/10.3366/drs.2017.0199
• Redd, Wyatt. ‌“A Plague in the Middle Ages Caused People to Dance Themselves to Death.” HistoryCollection.com, 28 Oct. 2017, historycollection.com/dancing-plauge-people-danced-death/
• ‌“The Dancing Plague.” Historical Blindness, www.historicalblindness.com/blogandpodcast//the-dancing-plague.
• Waller, John. “A forgotten plague: making sense of dancing mania.” The Lancet, vol. 373, no. 9664, 21 Feb. 2009, pp. 624-625, https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2809%2960386-X/fulltext.
• ‌Waller, John. “Dancing Plagues and Mass Hysteria - the British Psychological Society.” Www.bps.org.uk, 16 July 2009, www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/dancing-plagues-and-mass-hysteria.
• ‌Wright, Erin. “What Caused the Dancing Plague?” TheCollector, TheCollector, 11 June 2024, www.thecollector.com/what-caused-the-dancing-plague/
• The Plague That Made People Dance Themselves to Death

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