The Dancing Plague: When a City Couldn't Stop Moving

How one woman's strange dance in 1518 led to a contagious frenzy and a lesson in who gets remembered

Discover the astonishing story of the Dancing Plague of 1518, a bizarre phenomenon where hundreds of people in Strasbourg danced uncontrollably for days on end, some until exhaustion or death. This intriguing episode explores the mysterious causes behind mass hysteria, societal reactions, and the enduring questions it raises about human psychology and collective behavior. Tune in to see how a city’s inability to stop moving reveals fascinating insights into history’s strangest outbreaks of collective obsession.