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The Dancing Plague of 1518 was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg in July 1518. Numerous people took to dancing for days without rest, and, over the period of about one month, most of the people died from heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion.

The outbreak began in July 1518, when a woman, Frau Troffea, began to dance fervently in a street in Strasbourg. This lasted somewhere between four to six days. Within a week, 34 others had joined, and within a month, there were around 400 dancers.

As the dancing plague worsened, local physicians announced that the plague was a "natural disease" caused by "hot blood". Instead of prescribing bleeding, authorities encouraged more dancing by opening two guildhalls and even constructing a wooden stage.

The authorities did this because they believed that the dancers would only recover if they danced continually night and day. To increase the effectiveness of the cure, authorities even paid for musicians to keep the afflicted moving.