Plague of Motion: The Strange History of the Dancing Plague of 1518

In the summer of 1518, a woman began to dance in the streets of Strasbourg-and could not stop. Within days, dozens joined her. Within weeks, the city was caught in a fever of motion that no one understood. Was it divine punishment? Mass hysteria? A sickness of the body, or of the soul? This haunting true story explores one of history's strangest and most unsettling events-a collective madness that revealed the fragile boundaries between faith, fear, and the human need for meaning. Drawing from the world of medieval Europe on the edge of change, it uncovers how hunger, disease, superstition, and political tension converged to create a moment when reason lost its footing and belief took hold of the body itself. Moving between history, psychology, and reflection, the book examines what happens when suffering becomes rhythm, when the desperate search for understanding turns into performance, and when entire communities surrender to forces they cannot explain. More than a recounting of a bizarre episode, it is a meditation on what it means to be human under pressure-to seek order in chaos, purpose in pain, and unity in shared delirium. The dance ended five centuries ago. Its echoes have never stopped.