The dancing plague!

Many like to dance!

Then again in many functions you need one to start! Then everyone or at least most will join!

Now have you heard of a woman who danced for a week!

And that she made close to 400 people dance like or with her! Many till they dropped dead!

It is not fiction!

It is history!

So it was many many years ago!

It was called the Dancing Plague of 1518! The bizarre phenomenon of “dancing mania” that gripped the city of Strasbourg (then part of the Holy Roman Empire) between July and September 1518!

It started with a woman named Frau Troffea who began dancing fervently in a narrow street. She continued for nearly a week despite exhaustion and bloody feet!

Within a month, the “epidemic” grew to an estimated 400 people. The dancers were often in a trance-like state, flailing and convulsing rather than performing a joyful dance.

While controversial, contemporary accounts and modern historians like John Waller suggest that at its peak, up to 15 people died per day from heart attacks, strokes, and sheer exhaustion!

The first ‘cure’ suggested was to DANCE IT OUT!

Believing this the city council built wooden stages, cleared guild halls, and even hired professional musicians to keep the dancers moving!

When encouraging the dance only drew more victims, the council banned music and sent the worst-afflicted to a shrine dedicated to St. Vitus! There, they were given blessed red shoes and prayed for absolution!

Scientists and historians still debate the cause of the mania with no clear consensus as usual!

The leading theory, popularized by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, suggests it was stress-induced mass hysteria.

Strasbourg had recently suffered from extreme famine, disease (syphilis and smallpox), and severe social anxiety.

Some suggest the dancers ingested bread tainted with ergot fungus, which has hallucinogenic properties similar to LSD. However, critics like John Waller argue in the Lancet that ergotism usually makes it physically impossible to dance for days due to restricted blood flow!

The one thing which was noticable was that the ‘DANCERS’ did not need any music! Nor did they follow any specific pattern!

So if you do see someone like that in the middle of a street; please think a little before you join him or her!

The last time though I danced on the street was when India won the world cup in 2011! It was with music and fun! That was a dream for our birthday boy Sachin!

So maybe you can think of that and the latest cup victory and dance! But make sure there is a reason!