jackthedog
19-08-2005, 14:27
Taken from http://podiatry.curtin.edu.au/dance.html
Between the 13th to 16th century large populations of Europe were afflicted with frenzied dancing. People would gather together and dance until they dropped with exhaustion or sometimes death. The Dancing Plague or choreomania was a significant challenge to public health as it pervaded through the populations of Germany, Holland and Italy for three centuries. First described medically by Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim better known as Paracelsus (1493-1541). The cause of the dancing plague (or dancing mania) remains unknown.
Choreomania was always characterised by an uncontrollable impulse to dance, and a morbid love of music. Physical contact with an affected person was not a prerequisite for contracting the disease (the sight or sound of someone already afflicted could be sufficient).
Oh my god!
I just saw something about it in the Guiness Book of Records and had to check it out because it seems like a wind up!
Masses of people just start dancing uncontrollably until they either injure themselves, exhaust themselves or die! What the hell is that about?
Between the 13th to 16th century large populations of Europe were afflicted with frenzied dancing. People would gather together and dance until they dropped with exhaustion or sometimes death. The Dancing Plague or choreomania was a significant challenge to public health as it pervaded through the populations of Germany, Holland and Italy for three centuries. First described medically by Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim better known as Paracelsus (1493-1541). The cause of the dancing plague (or dancing mania) remains unknown.
Choreomania was always characterised by an uncontrollable impulse to dance, and a morbid love of music. Physical contact with an affected person was not a prerequisite for contracting the disease (the sight or sound of someone already afflicted could be sufficient).
Oh my god!
I just saw something about it in the Guiness Book of Records and had to check it out because it seems like a wind up!
Masses of people just start dancing uncontrollably until they either injure themselves, exhaust themselves or die! What the hell is that about?