THON is probably the most intense dance marathon you can think of. 46 hours of straight dancing? Only for the kids could someone agree to do something so ridiculous. People dance for a lot of reasons...for a cure, with the stars, to prove they think they can, even for a revolution. Dancing was even prohibited at one point! In colonial America, dancing was considered the work of the Devil and it even led to the death of nineteen people. Dancing has a great history in cultures all across the world, but probably nothing as strange as the Dancing Plague of 1518.
The Dancing Plague was possibly one of history's weirdest epidemics. As the name suggests, this is when people danced uncontrollably!
The whole ordeal began in July of 1518 in Strasbourg (part of the Holy Roman Empire) when a woman named Frau Troffea started dancing in the street and didn't stop for four to six days. Days! That's a ridiculous amount of time! We need no further proof that the human body is capable of incredible things. But, I digress. By the end of the week, 34 other people joined Frau Troffea and her crazed dancing. Within the month, the number skyrocketed to 400 people.
Historical doctors, in the grand tradition of being indubitably spot-on with their diagnoses, prescribed more dancing to cure the dancing epidemic. Naturally many people died from this "cure" due to heart attacks, strokes, or sheer exhaustion from the nonstop dancing.
For centuries, historians have tried to figure out what caused this epidemic. Eugene Backman, author of Religious Dances in the Christian Church and in Popular Medicine, sought a biological or chemical reasoning behind the dancing. Their findings? The most likely reason was ergot, a type of mold that grows on damp wheat. Erotamine is a psychoactive product of ergot, which is structurally related to lysergic acid diethylamide, and is what lysergic acid diethylamide was originally made from. That's right folks, over 400 people of the Holy Roman Empire were high on LSD and couldn't stop dancing because of it. And, as they say, the rest is history.
You know, I sat and thought long and hard about this story. How am I supposed to relate this to the present day and how people are now? After a good hour and a half of staring at my laptop trying to think of how this tale of a recreational drug epidemic could relate to the 21st century. My conclusion...I can't. This week, I've decided to entertain you with this story and to take the opportunity to say that perhaps humanity has progressed in the hundreds of thousands of years we have been here.
That is really crazy how there is such a thing as a Dancing Plague. I thought Frau Troffea was dancing just to dance or something when I read that part. I would have never guessed that the people were dancing because they were high. I also like how you compared it to THON at the beginning, which is like the 24-hour flu to the Spanish Flu equivalent to the Dancing Plague. I really liked your post.
ReplyDeleteHm... it seems like those people had it right... high on LSD before they even knew what it was? Hell yea! Just kidding. In all seriousness, I like how you transitioned into this very interesting topic using THON. This was informative, funny, and thought-provoking!
ReplyDeleteThis post was really funny and well written. I enjoy learning new historical facts each week in a clever and entertaining manner; keep up the good work.
ReplyDeleteThis is hilarious!! I can't believe so many people were hopped up on LSD. Can you imagine seeing something like this happening today? A giant 4 day long flash mob?
ReplyDeleteI thought that the idea of a dancing plague was something you made up, but by the end I could see it must have been an actual thing. That is so crazy. And also really funny. This was a clever line, "People dance for a lot of reasons...for a cure, with the stars, to prove they think they can, even for a revolution." I enjoyed your honest and ironic conclusion.
ReplyDeleteThis is a really interesting story! Good job finding something funny to write about and introducing it with an experience that we've either had already or will have soon enough.
ReplyDeleteI have never heard of this "plague" before, but after reading this post I am more than informed. I appreciate your commentary throughout the piece, adding to the background of your topic. Great post!
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