The Plague that made People Dance until they Dropped Dead

An unexplained phenomenon

Outbreaks of this so-called dancing mania involved groups of people dancing erratically and uncontrollably, sometimes in their hundreds or even thousands.
Like a disease, the mania would spread from town to town and even country to country as if it were contagious.
Historical records are sometimes very detailed about these outbreaks which affected men, women, and children dancing often until they collapsed from exhaustion or injuries.

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Credit:
Created by Daniel Turner (B.A. (Hons) in History, University College London)

Narrator:

Chris Kane

[ghostcreeper]

They took “dance till you’re dead” to a whole new level

[realquickbyte]

this is scarier than any horror movie i’ve ever seen. imagine actually witnessing this.

[shinchan-F-urmom]

"How did Johnny die?"
"Oh, he just danced till death."

[honnebombll]

Only Speculation, i could imagine that also ergot might have played a role in that. Denis Dodart, the personal physician of King Louis IV claimed in 1653 that ergot is resonsible for mass poisoning and wide spread hallucination as well as strange behaviour within whole communities and towns.
Ergot in general was one of the great curses of people in the middle ages.

[ComicalRealm]

They had seizures everyday and people thought we were doing the worm.

[MustacheCashStash]

Barber-Surgeon : Are you sick?
Patient : *dances*
Barber-Surgeon : I see you’re doing better, have a nice day

[gravysandwich]

Imagine having a time machine, but with no knowledge of this outbreak and going to the middle ages and seeing an entire village dancing for no reason.

[Xtermy]

3:54 -

Villagers: dance nonstop uncontrollably.

City: Hires musicians and builds a stage.

Villagers: dancing intensifies.

City: *facepalm*

[pickleman]

This takes "cmon everybody do that conga you cannot control yourself any longer" to another level

[theoutsider]

"She's a maniac, maniac on the floor
And she's dancing like she's never danced before"

[danielnoahalie]

This would actually be horrific if it occurred today. Just imagine if this hits a large city of 1million people. There would be no way to control it and people would just have to watch as friends and family, young and old uncontrollably dance until they collapse or fall dead in the street.

[z-man]

Can’t believe “Dance Till You’re Dead” has been literally done. Shouldn’t be “to” surprised considering some people die from working too hard. But damn this is bizarre

[ordinary_magician]

MrBeast: “Last to stop dancing wins $100, 000”

[ivanvladimir]

Stellaris players:
*Oh yeah, it's all coming together*

[Kurtheoraizor]

Imagine the head of Oblivion's AI design looked into this and was like "Yup, I think all NPCs ingame should act like this."

[this_is_history]

Interestingly, all the places affected by the dancing plagues of the Late Middle Ages and Early Modern Period, follow the path of the River Rhine, making the theory that this was a plague of ideas and not disease, much more plausible. Admittedly, a disease could easily spread by this route but the fallout of the socio-economic and cultural factors you mentioned would be much more 'contagious' to the people at the time and cause them to act out in that way.

[mas_n_cant_animate]

This brings a whole new meaning to dance till your dead.

[Empiremans]

this is genuinely scaring me, I don't know what makes it creepy, but it just is

[silverhawkscape]

What's interesting is that During the Great depression, Danceathon contest were held were winners get prizes. People would be so desperate they would dance until collapse from fatigue.

Looks like History repeats itself.

[martinxy]

"Ayo, John. WTF is going on with the npcs?"

"Oh yeah, after the Fall of rome patch that started happening. I think the plague feature is messed up"

"When are you gonna fix this? They're stuck like that and die of hunger"

"Eh next update. I'm still on vacation"