Disease has been humanity's constant companion throughout history - and some ailments seemed outright supernatural at the time. Let's take a look at...
- Dancing Plagues and the Tarantella (Mass Hysteria)
- St. Vitus Dance (Sydenham's Chorea)
- A Case of New England Vampirism (Tuberculosis)
- St. Anthony's Fire (Ergot Poisoning)
- The King Who Thought He Was Cattle (Boanthropy)
- Wendigo Psychosis (Culture-Bound Syndrome)
Dancing Plagues and the Tarantella (Mass Hysteria)
Did you know that Europe was one the victim of dancing plagues? These outbreaks were no laughing matter - in some instances hundreds of people were caught up in spontaneous outbreaks of dance, sustaining injuries and even fatalities from the prolonged exertions.
The dancing plague of 1518 was one such outbreak, taking place in the famine-struck city of Strasbourg during the summer heat. It began when one Frau Troffea stepped out into the street after an argument with her husband and began to dance, continuing until she collapsed from exhaustion. Upon regaining her energy, she resumed the activity in a pattern that continued for several days. By this point around thirty other citizens had joined the frenzy - and rather than attempting to suppress the dancers, authorities decided to gather them on stages and provide musical accompaniment. Presumably the idea was to get it out of their systems.
The idea failed miserably - and if anything, it helped spread the contagion. Reversing course, the authorities banned music and tied patients to wagon wheels to prevent them from moving. The plague only seemed to abate after the afflicted were taken on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Vitus - a figure said to curse sinners to dance. By the outbreak's end in September, up to four-hundred people had been affected and dozens had died.
The 1518 plague isn't the only example of choreomania. One of the earliest seems to have occurred in 1374, when residents of the city of Aachen in Germany began to dance themselves to exhaustion in the streets.
There's also the Italian tarantella dance. Confusingly, there are two such dances - one is a courtship dance from Taranto, but the other was seen to be a reflexive curative dance that could sweat out the venom of the Lycosa tarantula wolf spider. The condition (known as "tarantism") began one hour to a few days after the alleged bite, with the sufferer (usually people given to depression, hysteria and frustration) complaining of aches, worry and tiredness, then begin leaping, sobbing and convulsing. If provided with music the sufferer would dance instead, often tearing at their clothing and making provocative gestures as they did. Finally, the patient would fall asleep and wake up with little memory of the events.
Several explanations have been offered for these involuntary dances. Convulsive ergotism (poisoning by ergot fungus) has largely discounted as the symptoms don't really match up and not all outbreaks were near suitable crops for the fungus to infect. It's more likely that the outbreaks were the result of mass hysteria - you'll notice that in each of these cases victims were probably under a great deal of stress, which seems to be a major risk factor for the condition.
Does that all sound a bit far fetched? If so, I suggest you look up the koro outbreak of 1967, a mass hysteria event in which hundreds of Singapore's menfolk believed that their genitals were retracting into their body cavities!
St. Vitus Dance (Sydenham's Chorea)
We already mentioned St. Vitus, but he has an aliment all of his own. The story goes that he was a young Christian martyr, tortured by the Romans for holding on to his faith. Some time around the 16th century, a belief arose in Germany that dancing in front of his statue could bring good health for the coming year... and that he could offer protection against various dancing manias - specifically, St. Vitus Dance.
So what were the symptoms of St. Vitus Dance? Well, sufferers were subjected to uncontrolled and jerky movements of the limbs and body (hence "dance") with twitches in the muscles of the face (often resulting in grimaces) and sometimes the "milkmaid sign" where the hand defaults back into a posture as though milking a cow. The condition isn't limited to the physical either - patients can display verbal tics and speech disorders alongside developing anxiety disorders, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, ADHD and even psychosis. The most commonly affected are children (particularly girls) between the ages of 5 and 15. Fortunately, the prognosis is pretty good and the effects will usually fade over a few weeks... but you can see why people a few centuries ago attributed it to the supernatural!
Now you might be wondering what on earth could cause all that - and the answer is surprisingly simple. A streptococcal infection (strep throat, for example) that gets out of hand and causes rheumatic fever is all that's needed. Streptococcus cells can be quite similar to human brain and heart cells, which can cause our immune system to attack our own organs while trying to fight off the infection. The resulting damage to the brain is thought to cause Sydenham's chorea or St. Vitus Dance!
A Case of New England Vampirism (Tuberculosis)
It may seem insane to modern sensibilities but tuberculosis (sometimes called consumption) was romanticized in 18th and 19th century Europe. With a slow but inevitable progress, sufferers often had sparkling eyes and rosy cheeks from mild fever, pale skin from anemia and a small waist due to a lack of appetite. Many celebrity figures contracted the disease, leading it to be
considered a classy and dramatic way to die - Lord Byron (often considered a real-life inspiration for the modern vampire)
outright stated that he wished to die from the condition!
None of that helped
Mercy Lena Brown, a woman who died in 1892 Exeter, Rhode Island. Her mother and sister had already succumbed to tuberculosis, while her brother Edwin had moved to Colorado Springs upon showing symptoms of the disease. This actually seemed to have helped him resist the illness for a time - at least, until he returned to Exeter after his sister's passing. His condition soon worsened, and in fevered nightmares he would call out that “she was here” or “she wants me to come with her” and “she haunts me.” Putting two and two together, the other townsfolk surmised that either his mother or one of his sisters must be a vampire, draining the very life from his weakening body - and they eventually convinced his father to have the graves exhumed.
None of the bodies were deemed out of the ordinary by M.D. Harold Metcalf - the older remains were simply skeletons, while the more recently buried Lena had decayed in line with medical expectations. Despite this, her heart and liver were removed as part of the examination and cremated (some say the the ashes were given as a tonic to Edwin.) It didn't help - Edwin died less than two months later.
St. Anthony's Fire (Ergot Poisoning)
Ergot poisoning may not be behind the dancing plagues, but it seems to be largely responsible for a condition historically known as Holy Fire or St. Anthony's Fire.
St. Anthony lived between 251 and 356CE, living a solitary and largely harmless life near the Nile. Long after his death, St. Anthony was credited with being able to heal the potentially deadly disease - this reputation was cemented by the French noble Guérin la Valloire, who claimed to have been cured by the relics of the saint. Soon the
Order of Hospitallers of St. Anthony were named in his honor - and fittingly, they specialized in treating ergotism. It seems they were pretty serious about there role - they even painted the walls of their hospital red to reflect the burning sensation felt by sufferers of the condition.
Now
ergot itself is just a fungus that grows on rye and wheat as small dark fungal grows replacing some of the kernels... but consume it (say, by accidentally grinding the small fungus in with flour) and you'll regret it as
ergotism has some seriously nasty effects on the human brain and body. Neurological symptoms can include dizziness, headaches, convulsions, psychosis and coma, while gastrointestinal effects feature nausea, vomiting, pain, cramps and diarrhea. There's also the fact that ergot causes blood vessels to constrict, which can limit the amount of blood getting around the body. As a result, sufferers may become pale, cool and experience muscle pain... but worst of all is the potential for tissue to become so oxygen-starved it dies, necrotizing and developing gangrene.
Ergotism has been
suggested as having a role in the Salem Witch Trials, as many of the symptoms of witchcraft described by the victims could be explained by ergot poisoning. The fungus isn't all bad though - it was being used to induce labor by midwives centuries ago, while even in the modern era ergot derived drugs are used to control postpartum hemorrhage (bleeding after giving birth) and to treat migraines!
The King Who Thought He Was Cattle (Boanthropy)
You've probably heard of lycanthropy, the mythical curse that
allows (or forces) humans to transform into wolves. The name actually comes from the legend of
King Lycaon of Arcadia in Greek myth. This cruel and prideful monarch attempted to trick the god Zeus into eating human flesh... only for the god to see through his ruse and transform him into a wolf as punishment.
Much stranger is the story of
King Nebuchadnezzar the Great, as related in the biblical
Book of Daniel. The story goes that, having grown prideful of his accomplishments, Nebuchadnezzar was driven mad and reduced to living like a beast of the field (specifically an ox) for seven years. During this time his hair grew wild, his nails long and he spent his time grazing from the fields.
Though some have suggested other disorders like porphyria or even advanced untreated syphilis, it's generally accepted that the king was suffering from boanthropy - the bovine subclass of the rare but recognized disorder "
zoanthropy." This condition can come in many different forms and still occurs today - for example, there's a 2020 case report of a 54-year-old woman who (for a brief period)
believed she was a chicken.Wendigo Psychosis (Culture-Bound Syndrome)
Descriptions of the wendigo from North American legend may vary, but it's a consistently terrifying entity... especially since it may have once been human. In physical form this
icy, man-eating monster was often emaciated yet gigantic, shockingly fast, stealthy and cunning - the biggest giveaway for a potential victim was the unexplained scent of rotting meat. In spiritual form, it was said to be able to infect the dreams of a human and slowly turn them into a cannibal and eventually, a wendigo themselves.
Researchers now consider wendigo psychosis to be a form of
culture-bound syndrome, one that can occur when someone steeped in the mythology of the Algonquian-speaking tribes undergoes periods of extreme scarcity.
Those caught it it's grip experience anxiety, depression and sometimes changes in eating habits. As the condition worsens, it may be accompanied by paranoia and hallucinations in which other people are perceived as prey. Eventually the sufferer may act on these hallucinations, attacking and cannibalizing their fellow humans.
It's also possible that the idea of being slowly possessed by the spirit of a wendigo is a coping strategy, a way of mitigating the guilt felt by those contemplating cannibalism in an extreme survival situation. Take the case of
Swift Runner, a Cree trapper hanged in Alberta at Fort Saskatchewan in 1879. He arrived at the Catholic Mission in St. Albert after a particularly harsh winter, one in which he said the rest of his family had starved to death.
Suspicions were aroused when it was revealed that the trapper looked fairly well nourished - and that he kept experiencing fevered nightmares, which he explained as the result of being tormented by a windigo (variant spelling of wendigo.) The mission tipped off the police, who brought Swift Runner to his previous campsite - a place littered with scraps of human remains. There he confessed to murdering and cannibalizing his family.
He went to his death blaming spiritual possession for his crimes, but also expressed an incredible sense of guilt for his actions - in fact, he even said that he didn't deserve to be called a man.
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