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Frau Troffea stepped out on to the street and began to dance. Under the full heat of the sun,
she moved frenetically to an imaginary beat. As sweat gathered on her brow and blisters grew
on her feet, she found that she couldn’t stop. Soon, more than 30 people had joined her,
dancing day and night. By the time the authorities were alerted, 100 or so people had been
infected by this ‘dancing plague’, a phenomenon that afflicted the townspeople of Strasbourg
in the summer of 1518. Many collapsed from exhaustion; some died. In etchings depicting
similar occurrences from throughout the medieval era, the …