kyrie eleison
Frau Troffea
† July · 1518 · Strasbourg †
the first to dance. the one who would not stop.
In the heat of July, 1518, in the narrow stone streets of Strasbourg, a woman named Frau Troffea stepped from her door and began to dance.
She danced without music. She danced without smiling. She danced through the afternoon and into the night, and when the moon rose she was still dancing. She danced until her shoes filled with blood, and then she danced barefoot on the stones.
By the end of the week, thirty-four others had joined her.
Within the month, four hundred.
They danced until their bones splintered. They danced until their hearts burst in their chests. They danced until they fell, and some of those who fell did not rise again.
The city council, believing the affliction to be a fever of blood that would be cured by further motion, hired pipers and drummers and carpenters. They built a wooden stage in the grain market. They hired musicians to play. They brought in professional dancers to lead them.
It did not help. It made it worse.
The plague ended in September, as suddenly and quietly as it had begun. The chronicles close. The musicians pack their drums. The stage is taken down. No one writes why.
No one, to this day, knows what possessed them.
No one, to this day, knows what possessed her.
Lord of the long summer,
keep us from the music we cannot hear.
Keep our feet on the stone.
Keep our bones in their sockets.
Keep our hearts in their cages.