目录：
何为集体癔症？
集体癔症的起因与特征
历史上最令人费解的12件集体癔症事件
萨勒姆女巫审判
法国猫叫修女
咬人的修女
1518年的舞蹈瘟疫
米兰投毒恐慌
里尔寄宿学校巫术癔症
1688爱尔兰恐慌
哈默史密斯闹鬼癔症
哈利法克斯剃须刀伤人者
台北剃须刀伤人者
坦噶尼喀州笑声瘟疫
麦克马丁幼儿园虐童集体癔症
Mass hysteria, more formally known as mass psychogenic illness (MPI), is the spread of illness symptoms or physiological changes that have no bacterial, environmental or pathogenic cause. Such cases of mass hysteria have been documented for hundreds of years, and continue to this day!
集体癔症（癔症/歇斯底里，指表现出过度强烈或不受控制情绪的行为），更正式的名称是群体性心因性疾病（MPI），是指没有任何细菌、环境或病原体起因的疾病症状或生理变化在群体中扩散。数百年来一直存在这种群体癔症案例记录，至今依旧存在。
During the Salem Witch Trials of 1692-1693 in colonial Massachusetts, 19 people were killed on suspicion of being witches or practitioners of the dark arts. More than 200 people were accused, and the entire tragedy was an example of mass hysteria. After a handful of girls displayed physical symptoms similar to epileptic fits, accusations of witchcraft began to spread among the colonial settlers. Neighbors turned against one another, false reports were made, and physical symptoms manifested in more citizens. This remains one of the most famous and deadliest examples of mass hysteria in history, but it is far from the only one.
在殖民地时期马萨诸塞州 1692-1693年的塞勒姆女巫审判事件期间，19人因被怀疑是女巫或实施邪恶巫术而被处死。超过200人被指控，整个悲剧都是集体癔症的一个鲜明例子。在最初一些女孩表现出一些类似于癫痫发作的生理症状后，对巫术的怀疑开始传播于殖民者群体中。邻居们互相揭发、诬告。更多市民都表现出了生理症状。这至今依旧是历史上最致命、后果最恶劣的集体癔症例子，但绝非唯一。
Even in this information age of the 21st century, with smartphones and instant access to articles about mass hysteria, there are still examples of this phenomenon happening around the world. What in the world could cause such bizarre events of collective weirdness?
即使是在21世纪信息时代，智能手机无处不在，关于集体癔症的文章随时都可立即获取，但集体癔症现象依旧存在。到底是哪些原因导致了这种奇怪的集体怪异呢？
What is Mass Hysteria? 何为集体癔症？
Mass hysteria is medically classified as a mass psychogenic disorder, meaning that it is a condition that begins in the mind, rather than the body. Imagine dozens of nuns in a convent that begin meowing at one another (Middle Ages), or hundreds of soldiers all begin to experience respiratory symptoms, despite not being exposed to any toxins or pathogens (1988). Whereas a contagious pathogen can be traced by its physical movement between hosts, mass hysteria spreads like a contagious outbreak of fear, anxiety or mania.
集体癔症在医学上被归类为一种群体性心因障碍，即，是一种源于心理而非生理因素的病症。想象一座修道院里数十位修女一起向彼此喵喵叫（中世纪），或者数百位士兵一起产生呼吸症状，尽管并未接触任何毒素或病原（1988）。对于具有传染性的病原体，在宿主之间可追踪到其传播踪迹，但集体癔症的传播像是一种具有传染性的恐惧、焦虑或癫狂爆发。
Although there is not technically a “cause” that can be pointed towards, the symptoms that manifest are often very real, including dizziness, headaches, vomiting, fainting, biting, dancing, flailing, spasming and dozens of other manifestations that have been documented throughout history.
尽管无确切“原因”，但集体癔症所表现出的症状通常非常真实，包括眩晕、头痛、呕吐、晕倒、咬人、跳舞、肢体疯狂乱扭、痉挛，以及历史上所记录的其他数十种症状。
Given the strange nature of this phenomenon, it has been the subject of intense study and speculation over the years. Simon Wesley, a British psychiatrist, suggested that there are two forms of mass psychogenic illness—mass anxiety hysteria and mass motor hysteria. The former is characterized by the experience of intense anxiety, and is often accompanied by recognizable symptoms of anxiety, including nausea, headaches, dizziness, difficulty breathing, vomiting, fainting and psychological distress. This type of hysteria is believed to spread through visual contact with others experiencing these symptoms, which induces similar symptoms in the observer. This “line of sight” causation is coupled with other individuals in the same environment who are not experiencing any negative symptoms.
鉴于这一现象的奇怪性质，多年来围绕该主题有众多研究和猜测理论。英国精神学家Simon Wesley认为，有两种形式的群体心因疾病——
群体焦虑癔症和群体机动癔症。
前者的特征是患者经历强烈焦虑，通常伴有明显的焦虑症状，包括恶心、头痛、眩晕、呼吸困难、呕吐、晕倒和心理痛苦等。这一类型的癔症的传播方式被认为是：看到其他人表现出这些症状，激发了观察者自身的类似症状。这种因“视线”而导致的传播情形中，同环境中也有其他人并不会表现出任何负面症状。
The second form of mass psychogenic illness—mass motor hysteria—is characterized by strange motor activity in the body; anxiety symptoms often develop before a physical manifestation appears. This could include biting, dancing, running, jumping, partial paralysis, trembling, or more violent physical tics and outbursts. Unlike mass anxiety hysteria, this variety tends to spread more gradually, and may last for longer periods of time. In some cases in history, mass motor hysteria has persisted for weeks or even months.
第二种形式，即群体机动癔症，特征是奇怪的肢体活动。在表现出肢体症状之前通常会表现出焦虑症状。这些肢体症状包括：咬人、跳舞、奔跑、跳跃、局部瘫痪、发抖、或更猛烈的肢体痉挛和动作等。同群体焦虑癔症不同，这一类型癔症通常传播方式更偏向于渐进式，而且可能会延续更长时间。历史上，一些群体机动癔症曾延续数周，甚至数月。
Causes and Characteristics of Mass Hysteria 集体癔症的起因与特征
This unusual phenomenon is still poorly understood in the medical community, as the conditions cannot be organically replicated; when a case arises, it can be studied in the moment, but due to certain characteristics of “epidemic hysteria”, long-term study or analysis is impossible. The causes behind these instances vary widely, but there are some clear elements to its etiology.
医学界对这一非正常现象至今依旧所知甚少，因为这类病症无法自然复制。当这样一个事件发生时，当时可以对其进行研究，但鉴于“流行癔症”的特定特征，完全无法开展长期研究或分析。这类事件各自背后的起因有着很大不同，但却有着一些明确的因素。
01 Isolation / Societal Segregation
In many cases of mass psychogenic illness, those affected are in an isolated or segregated group, such as a convent, school, rural community or military base etc. The community tends to be close-knit and may be subject to the same type of lifestyle or belief structure. This slight distance from the rest of the world is believed to help cultivate and spread this phenomenon. You will rarely see an outsider coming into such a situation and becoming afflicted by the MPI.
隔离——社会隔离：在很多群体心因疾病案例中，患者通常处于一个被隔离的群体内，比如修道院、学校、农村群体或军事基地等。这些群体通常关系紧密，而且可能具有相同的生活方式和信念体系。这种与世界其他地方的略有隔绝的状态，被认为助长了这种现象的发生与传播。几乎很少会看到有外来者进入这样一种情形，然后也患上这种MPI。
02 High-Anxiety Situation
There is usually a significant increase in anxiety that accompanies such an event. This could be driven by an acute situation, such as the fear of spreading disease after one townsperson mysterious falls ill. It could also be a more chronic anxiety issue, such as the general nervousness leading up to a military campaign, a long-term shortage of food, an oppressive culture or government, or an elevated fear of bioterrorism. When these fears are shared among the group, an MPI is more readily triggered. Some experts suggest that throughout history, intense psychological anxiety has led to mass hysteria as a means of escape or relief; abandoning normality and reality can be an effective defense of the mind against existential (or real) threats.
高度焦虑情形：在这类事件中通常伴有焦虑程度的显著增高。这种焦虑可能源于一种突然事件，比如在一位居民莫名患病后，导致对疾病传播的恐惧。也可能源于一种慢性因素，比如在军事战役前的普遍紧张感、长期缺乏食物、压迫式文化或政府或对生化恐怖袭击与日俱增的恐惧感。当这种恐惧在群体中蔓延，就更可能触发MPI。一些专家认为，纵观历史，强烈的心理焦虑曾经导致集体癔症，因为人们将此视为一种解脱或缓解。在面对生存（或现实生活中）威胁时，抛弃常态和现实，可以作为大脑的一种有效防御机制。
03 Transient, Benign and Sourceless Symptoms
Although some of the symptoms can be intense, such as wild spasms and vomiting, they are generally harmless and pass relatively quickly (minutes, hours or days). There is no obvious source for these symptoms (e.g., pathogens, bacteria, environmental toxins), and they rarely pose a direct threat to a person’s health. Remember, a physical agent doesn’t need to be responsible; our minds can generate a physiological response just as easily.
转瞬即逝的、良性的、无来源的症状——尽管一些症状很激烈，比如猛烈痉挛和呕吐，但整体而言，集体癔症的症状通常无害，且较快消失（数分钟、数小时或数天）。这些症状并没有明显来源（比如、病原体、细菌、环境毒素），而且几乎很少会对一个人的健康产生直接威胁。记住，并不一定总是实体因素在作祟，我们的思维也可以轻松导致生理反应。
04 Primarily Affecting Females
Although there are many heterogenous examples of mass psychogenic illness, these phenomena have predominantly affected females. Use of the “term” hysteria has largely been discontinued in medical practice and discussion, as it was abused and overused in relation to feminine behavior and psychological frailty in the past century. However, women are often exposed to stressful situations in isolated settings; combined with emotional openness and empathy, this may explain why women seem more commonly affected than men.
主要影响女性：尽管群体心因疾病影响人群各有不同，但主要还是影响女性。在医学执业与讨论中，“癔症/歇斯底里”这一术语已经在很大程度上被停用，因为在上世纪这一词汇在描述女性行为与女性心理脆弱性方面被滥用和过度使用。但在隔绝环境中被置于压力情形的通常是女性，加上女性易于流露情绪且富有同理心，这可能能够解释为什么女性比男性更容易受影响。
05 Age Pattern
– The symptoms often begin in older or more respected members of a group and community, and gradually move down the age range. This was the case in the Salem Witch Trials and many other famous examples. It is as though younger people “take the lead” from older, established individuals. A young person’s trust and inherent respect for an elder makes them more likely to believe in the apparent danger and even fall victim to the same symptoms. This “age cascade” is also interesting in that younger people often show symptoms for a shorter period of time than older sufferers.
年龄规律：集体癔症症状通常始于一个群体或社群中年龄较长或者更受敬重的成员之间，逐渐向更年轻群体传播。在塞勒姆女巫审判以及其他著名案例中均是如此。仿佛年轻人追随着年长、德高望重者的脚步。年轻人对年长者的信任与发自内心的尊重让他们更可能相信有明显危险存在，甚至也发展出同样症状。这种“年龄瀑布”的另一有趣之处在于：年轻人的症状持续期限往往短于年长者。
06 Serious Threat
The appearance of symptoms initially seems like the outbreak of a more serious disease or infection. For this reason, even if people suspect an incident to be an episode of mass hysteria, the threat must be taken seriously. School closures, hospitalizations and large-scale responses to outbreaks can increase the legitimacy of the danger, which may lead others to begin developing symptoms. Such a phenomenon can only be identified as an MPI in retrospect, whereas during the event, it must be approached as a serious threat.
宁可相信真正存在危险：症状最初像是一种严重疾病或感染的爆发。因此，即使人们怀疑是集体癔症发作，也必须对可能存在的威胁认真对待。学校关闭、就医、和大规模应对措施等都可能会让人更加觉得有危险存在，就可能导致其他人开始发展出症状。这种现象只能在事件结束后回顾时来判定是MPI，但在事件发生过程中，则必须按照存在真正的威胁来处理。
12 of History’s Most Baffling Mass Hysteria Outbreaks 历史上最令人费解的12件集体癔症事件
Mass hysteria, or collective delusion outbreaks, are more common than people realize. Most are familiar with some of history’s most dramatic mass hysterias, such as the one surrounding the Salem Witch Trials, but other outbreaks have come and gone, without garnering as much attention or causing as much harm as that of Salem.
集体癔症，或集体妄想发作，比人们所知的要更普遍。很多人都很熟悉历史上一些最知名的集体癔症，如萨勒姆女巫审判，但其他一些类似事件并没有吸引很多关注或像萨勒姆事件一样造成如此大伤害。
Mass hysterias are sociogenic, mental illnesses that propagate and spread rapidly within a community, with psychological symptoms sometimes coming out and manifesting themselves as physical conditions. They often are caused by longstanding stresses and fears within a community, with symptoms slowly building up and emerging over a prolonged period of time, ranging from weeks to months. They usually explode in a rapidly contagious outbreak that engulfs the community or a large portion thereof, before subsiding over a period of weeks or months.
集体癔症是由社会因素导致的、在一个社群中快速传播的一种精神疾病，其心理症状有时表现为生理疾病症状。它们通常由社群内的长期压力和恐惧所导致，症状逐渐累积，在很长一段时间内，从数周至数月，逐渐浮现。然后它们通常会迅速传播爆发，迅速蔓延整个社群或社群中很大一部分人群，之后在数周或数月内逐渐消退。
While most outbreaks of mass hysteria are more or less harmless, there have been quite a few throughout history that was far more bizarre. Indeed, many outbreaks proved just as dramatic or deadly as the one presaging the Salem Witch Trials, or even more so in their pernicious impact. Following are twelve of history’s most remarkable outbreaks of mass hysteria.
尽管很多集体癔症都或多或少无害，但历史上也有一些极其匪夷所思。很多这类事件都像是萨勒姆女巫审判之前的情形一样夸张或致命，甚至就其各自危害而言，有过之而无不及。下面是历史上12件最知名的集体癔症事件。
01 Salem Witch Trials 萨勒姆女巫审判
Perhaps history’s most famous or infamous case of mass hysteria, the Salem Witch craze of 1692 – 1693 took place against a cultural and religious background that was predisposed to believe in the supernatural. While witchcraft is laughable to most today, in seventeenth-century Colonial America, and especially in Salem and the Massachusetts Bay Colony, it was taken quite seriously. The belief that the Devil could grant witches extraordinary powers in return for their loyalty, and that witchcraft could be used to inflict harm on the good and godly, was taken for granted.
可能是历史上最知名的集体癔症事件了。1692-1693年萨勒姆女巫狂热发生于信奉超自然力量的文化和宗教背景下。尽管如今很多人对巫术只会嗤之以鼻，但在17世纪的美国殖民时期，尤其是在萨勒姆和马萨诸塞湾殖民地，人们却对此深信不疑。人们发自内心认为，魔鬼给予女巫们非凡力量，以换取她们的忠诚，且巫术会危害真善美，危害神圣。
It began in January of 1692 when the 9-year-old daughter and 11-year-old niece of Salem’s reverend started having screaming fits, during which they contorted themselves into unnatural positions, threw things, and made weird noises. A local doctor, finding no signs of physical ailment, blamed it on the supernatural. Soon, another young girl, aged 11, started exhibiting similar symptoms.
一切始于1692年，萨勒姆镇牧师的9岁女儿和11岁侄女开始时不时尖叫，发作时，身体会扭曲变形，扔东西、发出奇怪声音。一位本地医生没有找到任何生理疾病，并将这些症状归咎于超自然原因。很快，另一位11岁的年轻女孩也开始表现出类似症状。
Examined by magistrates, the girls accused three women of bewitching them: the reverend’s black slave, Tituba, an elderly impoverished woman named Sarah Osborne, and a homeless beggar named Sarah Good. Osborne and Good protested their innocence, but for whatever reason – perhaps torture or perhaps a promise of leniency – Tituba confessed to having been visited by the Devil, whom she described as a black man who asked her to sign a book. Admitting that she signed, Tituba went on to point the finger at other “witches”.
当地法官调查这一事件时，这些女孩指控三位女性向她们施展了巫术：牧师的黑人努力 Tituba、一位名为 Sarah Osborn的贫苦年长女性，一位名为 Sarah Good的流浪乞丐。Osborne和Good都坚称自己是清白的，但出于某种原因，可能是折磨，也或者是被许诺会宽大处理，Tituba承认自己被接触过恶魔，她描述说该恶魔是一名黑人，并让她在一本书上签名。在承认了她签署了这本书之后，她继续指认了其他“女巫”。
The mass hysteria then erupted, and over the following months, a flood of accusations came pouring in, and the more farfetched they were, the more they solidified the populace’s belief in the potency of witchcraft and enhanced the panic. When the godly and regular churchgoer Martha Corey was accused of witchcraft, rather than give the good people of Salem pause, it merely redoubled their fears: if solid citizen Martha Corey could be a witch, then anybody could be a witch.
之后，集体癔症突然爆发。在接下来数月内，大量指控涌入，它们越牵强离谱，越让人们更加坚信巫术的强大，越让人们感到恐慌。当行为端正的虔诚教徒 Martha Corey也被指控施展巫术时，并没有让萨勒姆镇的居民们停下来，反而让他们的恐惧翻倍：如果像 Martha Corey这种模范市民也可能是个女巫，那么任何人都可能是女巫。
On May 27th, the colony’s governor ordered the establishment of a special court to try the accused, and its first victim was Bridget Bishop, an older woman known as gossip and with a reputation for promiscuity. Her protestations of innocence were unavailing, and she was convicted, sentenced to death, and hanged on June 10th in what became known as Gallows Hill. Five more were convicted and hanged in July, another five in August, and eight more that September.
5月27日，殖民地总督下令成立特别法庭审判被指控者。第一位受害者是 Bridget Bishop，一位年龄较长、众所周知地爱八卦和有个人作风问题的女性。她对自己无罪的抗辩毫无作用，她被判有罪，被判处死刑，并且在6月10日，在后来被称为绞刑架山的地方被吊死。另外五位也被判有罪，在7月被绞死，另外五位8月份被绞死，9月份，绞死另外8位。
The trials were marked by a lack of due process, and the use of “spectral evidence” – basically, testimony by witnesses that they dreamt or had a vision that the spirit or “spectre” of the accused witch did them harm. Thus, an accuser’s dream or vision that “Jane Doe bit, hit, and punched me“, was admissible evidence in court that Jane Doe had actually bit, hit, and punched the accuser, even if the unfortunate Doe was nowhere near the accuser that day – her spectre was. Respected theologian and reverend Cotton Mathers wrote the court cautioning against the use of spectral evidence, but was ignored.
这些审判明显缺乏正当程序，而且采用了“幽灵证据”，即，证人们的证词来自于他们梦见或看到一种幻象：被指控者的灵魂伤害了他们。这样，一位指控者的这种“我梦见一种场景或看到一种幻象：某某某咬了我、打了我或给了我一拳”在法庭上被视为合理定罪证据，即使这个很不幸的某某某当日完全不在指控者附近——但她的灵魂在。当时备受尊敬的神学家和牧师 Cotton Mathers致信法庭，反对这种对幽灵证据的采用，但却受到无视。
The colony’s governor finally put an end to the trials and their ever-expanding circle of accusations when his own wife was accused of being a witch, by which point 200 people had been accused of witchcraft, and 20 had already been hanged. Eventually, the authorities admitted that the trials had been a mistake, and compensated the families of the wrongly convicted victims of the witch hunt. Thereafter, the Salem mass hysteria and resultant trials became synonymous with paranoia and injustice, and stand today as a cautionary tale about the dangers of religious extremism, false accusations, and the lack of due process.
后来，当殖民地总督的妻子也被指控是一名女巫时，殖民地总督最终不得不终止这些审判和逐渐增加的指控，截至当时，已经有200人被指控施展巫术，而且已经有20位被绞死。最终，管理者们终于承认这些审判是一个错误，而且对这一女巫捕杀运动中被冤枉的受害者的家人们给予了赔偿。在此之后，萨勒姆集体癔症以及后续审判成为疑心病和不正义的代名词，而且在今天成为了警示宗教极端主义、虚假指控和缺乏正当程序之危险性的警示寓言。
02 The Cat Nuns of France 法国猫叫修女
Before the modern era, many outbreaks of mass hysteria occurred within religious institutions. Convents were in particularly prime grounds, ripe for eruptions of contagious mass delusion. That was because convents, especially in Medieval days, contained large numbers of nuns who had been forced into them by their families. Once in, they were compelled to lead lives that many found disagreeable.
在进入现代社会之前，很多集体癔症都发生于宗教机构中。修道院尤其是集体癔症的理想温床。这是因为，修道院，尤其是在中世纪时期的修道院里有大量的因家人强迫而进来的修女们。一旦进入修道院后，她们就要被迫过着很多人都会觉得凄苦的生活。
Inside the convents, many of the unfortunate girls or women forced into becoming nuns were confined in prison-like conditions and led a stressful lifestyle that was not of their own choosing. Among other things, the nuns were expected to be celibate, and submit to poverty, hard work, and unquestioning obedience to authority figures who had the right to compel compliance. Often they were compelled with coercive measures ranging from the imposition of extra labor, to confinement in cells, or withholding food and water. Physical chastisement and punishment were also available. This ranged from whipping and caning in-house, to turning over the most defiant nuns to ecclesiastic courts. If things went particularly bad, they could end up with a hardheaded nun getting burned to death for witchcraft or demonic possession.
在修道院中，很多不幸的女性被迫成为修女，行动受限，如若被囚禁于监狱中，生活在高压之下，且这一切都并非她们的自主选择。其中，修女们被要求禁欲、安于贫穷、辛苦劳作、对有权力的权威人物绝对服从。通常，管理者通过额外劳作、关进囚牢、不给水和食物等胁迫措施强迫她们。另外也存在肢体暴力惩罚，惩罚措施从修道院内鞭笞和杖打，到将最不听话的修女交给宗教法庭处理。如果情形变得非常恶劣，他们可能就会假借巫术或邪魔附身之名将这个固执的修女烧死。
Such conditions of communal longstanding stress and fear are textbook causes for the outbreak of mass hysteria. So it is not surprising that nunneries frequently experienced eruptions of mass delusions. One of the more bizarre incidents occurred in a French convent in the Middle Ages. A nun started meowing like a cat – an animal viewed in Europe at the time not as a cute and cuddly pet, but as being associated with Satan.
这种长期高压和恐惧情形简直就是集体癔症爆发的教科书般的原因。所以，修道院频繁爆发集体癔症，也就不足为奇了。其中最诡异的事件发生于中世纪法国一座修道院。一位修女开始像猫一样喵喵叫，当时在欧洲，猫并不被视为一种可爱、让人想抱抱的宠物，而是被视为与撒旦有关。
Soon, other nuns in the convent joined in and started meowing, and before long, the whole convent was meowing. It eventually became chorus-like, with all the nuns joining in collective caterwauling for several hours each day. Understandably, the cacophony alarmed and upset the neighbors, particularly in light of cats’ association with the devil and demonic possession. Pleas to stop were not heeded, so soldiers were eventually called in ordered to whip the meowing sisters into silence. That finally brought the mass hysteria outbreak to an end.
很快，修道院的其他修女也加入进来，开始猫叫。不久，就蔓延了整个修道院。最终变成了这样一种情形：所有修女们每天集体合唱般猫叫数小时。可以想象，这种刺耳怪声让周围居民惊恐且困扰不已，尤其是当时猫是一种和魔鬼和魔鬼附身被联系在一起的动物。他们请求修女们停止但无果，因此，最终士兵们被命令进入修道院，通过鞭笞方式让修女们停止。这样，这一集体癔症才告终。
03 The Biting Nuns Outbreak 咬人的修女
Long-term stresses and fears such as those leading to the meowing nuns were not unique to that particular convent or to France, but applied throughout the era’s Christendom. Across the Rhine from France in Germany, similar stressors led to a mass hysteria outbreak in the 15th century. It began when a nun started biting the other sisters in her convent. Before long, the behavior spread and the convent was full of crazed nuns running around and biting each other.
像上面导致修女猫叫的长期高压与恐惧并非仅存在于那一座修道院，或仅存在于法国，而是普遍存在于当时时代的整个基督教世界。在莱茵河对岸的德国，在15世纪，同样的应激源（压力因素）也导致了一次集体癔症的爆发。这一事件始于一位修女开始咬修道院里的其他修女。很快，这一行为开始扩散，然后这一修道院里就到处都是疯狂般互相追逐互相咬对方的修女。
As described by a 15th-century doctor: “A nun in a German nunnery fell to biting all her companions. In the course of a short time, all the nuns of this convent began biting each other. The news of this infatuation among the nuns soon spread and it now passed convent to convent throughout a great part of Germany principally Saxony and It afterward visited the nunneries of Holland and at last, the nuns had biting mania even as far as Rome.”
一位15世纪的医生如此描述：“德国一座修道院的一位修女开始经常咬其同伴，在短短时间内，这一修道院所有修女都表现出这一症状。关于这一现象的新闻迅速传播，如今已经在修道院之间开始传播，遍及德国很大一部分地区，主要是萨克森州，之后，这一现象也发生在了荷兰的一些修道院，最后，甚至在罗马也发现了这种修女咬人的疯狂情形。”
As seen above, the German nuns’ mass hysteria did the French ones one better by not being restricted to a single convent. The hysteria also traveled south and crossed the Alps into Italy.
如上所述，德国修女的集体癔症要比法国的修女集体癔症更高一筹，因为它已经不再局限于一座修道院。这一集体癔症甚至还一路南下，越过阿尔卑斯山，一路到了意大利。
The authorities were baffled and alarmed, and attempted various countermeasures as “the Nuns, at length, worried one another from Rome to Amsterdam“. When prayers and masses failed, the Church resorted to exorcisms and the casting out of devils and demons, but to no avail. So they resorted to a more basic approach and threatened to flog or dunk into the water any nun who bit another. That worked, and after a few salutary examples were made, the nuns quickly came to their senses and the biting fever rapidly subsided.
当权部门困惑不解而且非常震惊，并尝试了各种各样的压制措施，在当时，“从罗马到阿姆斯特丹，最终修女们互相之间都彼此担心”。当祈祷和弥撒无果，教堂开始开展驱魔仪式，驱逐恶魔，但也依旧无效。因此，他们采用了一种更加简单粗暴的方式，他们威胁如果修女再咬人，就要受到鞭笞或被浸入水中。这一方法很奏效，在一些以儆效尤的例子过后，修女们很快恢复理智，这一狂热咬人事件很快平息了。
04 Dance Plague of 1518 1518年的舞蹈瘟疫
We all get a jingle or tune stuck in our heads every now and then, and end up humming and mumbling it nonstop or on and off for hours or days on end. That is bad enough, but what about taking that up a notch: how about a dance move that one can’t stop? Almost everyone loves a good shimmy but what happens if the shimmy is so good that you just can’t quit, and end up dancing yourself to death?
我们偶尔都经历过一段旋律萦绕脑海挥之不去，导致我们连续数小时或数天无休止或断断续续地哼这段曲子。这已经很糟糕了，但如果再将其升级：如果是无法停止一个舞蹈动作呢？几乎每个人都喜欢畅快跳个舞，但如果这段舞蹈让你如此畅快以至于你根本停不下来，甚至最后跳到死亡呢？
That is what the people of Strasbourg, Alsace, in what is now France, discovered in July of 1518, when their town fell into the grip of a dancing mania. Hundreds of people started dancing nonstop, for days on end. By the time the dance fever finally broke, many of the good people of Strasbourg had literally danced themselves to death from heart attacks, strokes, or plain exhaustion.
这就是发生于1518年7月，属于现在法国的阿尔萨斯大区斯特拉斯堡所发生的一次事件。当时，他们发现他们的整个城镇都陷入了一种舞蹈狂热。数百人开始无休止跳舞，连续数日。当这一舞蹈狂热最终爆发，斯特拉斯堡的很多品行端正居民真的因跳舞而导致的心脏病、中风或劳累过度而死亡。
It began innocently enough one sunny July morning, when a Frau Troffea started dancing in the street. Onlookers clapped, laughed, and cheered her high spirits and joie de vivre as she danced. And danced. And danced some more. Frau Troffea danced without rest or respite for 6 days, and within a week, she had been joined by dozens in her marathon dance, mostly women.
一切都毫无危险征兆地发生于一个阳光和煦的七月份的清晨，当时一位名叫 Frau Troffea的女子开始在街上跳舞，路人们鼓掌欢笑，为她的活力和对生活的热情而喝彩。她一直跳，一直跳，一直跳，最终好无休止连续跳了6天，一周之内，就已经有数十位加入了她的舞蹈马拉松，其中大部分是女性。
Alarmed, authorities consulted local physicians, who opined that the cause was “hot blood”. On the theory that the dancers would recover only if they got it out of their system by dancing continuously, musicians were hired, a wooden stage was erected, and additional dancing space was made by opening up guildhalls and clearing out a marketplace to make more room. Those measures backfired, and simply ended up encouraging even more people to join the hysteria. Within a month, the number of nonstop dancers had ballooned into the hundreds, and at the height of the craze, 15 dancers were dying each day from exhaustion and heart attacks.
当权部门深感震惊，他们咨询了当地医生们，医生们认为原因是“热血”，他们给出的解释是，这些跳舞的人只有通过不断跳舞，将“热血”排出体外之后才能恢复。根据他们的这一理论，当权部门雇佣了音乐家们、搭建了一个木质舞台，开放多个会馆，清空一个市场以提供更多舞蹈场地。这些措施却适得其反，最终鼓励了更多人加入这一癔症。一个月之内，这些不知疲倦的舞蹈者人数已经膨胀到数百人，而且在最疯狂时，每天有15位因疲劳和心脏病而死亡。
The Strasbourg dance plague was not an isolated incident, and between the 14th and 17th centuries, there were enough similar outbreaks for contemporaries to coin a term for the phenomena: Saint Vitus’ Dance, or Saint John’s Dance. There is no modern consensus on the cause, so it is simply categorized as an unusual social phenomenon – a mass public hysteria, or a mass psychogenic illness of unknown provenance.
斯特拉斯堡舞蹈瘟疫并非孤例。在14至17世纪之间，有足够多的类似事件爆发，以至于当时的人们为这类现象取了一个名称：圣维特之舞，或圣约翰之舞。关于癔症起因，当代并无一致意见，因此这类事件只是被简单归类于一种不寻常的社会现象——一种原因未知的群体性公众癔症或群体性心因疾病。
05 Milan Poisoning Scare 米兰投毒恐慌
Europeans of the 17th century were prone to fears that nefarious people planned to spread a plague throughout Christendom via sinister means, such as sorcery and witchcraft, or mysterious “poisonous gasses”. Those standing fears were exacerbated in the city of Milan, Italy, after its governor received a message in 1629 from king Philip IV of Spain, warning him to be on the lookout for four Frenchman who had escaped from a Spanish prison and might be en route to Milan to spread the plague via “poisonous and pestilential ointments“.
17世纪的欧洲人很易于产生这样的恐惧：居心叵测之人试图通过邪恶手段，比如邪术巫术等，或神秘的“有毒气体”，在基督教群体中散播一种瘟疫。而这些已经存在的恐惧在下述事件之后被进一步放大：1629年，意大利米兰市长从西班牙国王菲利普四世收到信息，被警告说需要提防从西班牙监狱越狱，可能正在去往米兰路上的4个法国人，他们的目的是通过一种“有毒且会引发瘟疫的药膏”散播瘟疫。
For months after the royal warning, tensions mounted in Milan as the alarmed citizens kept a wary lookout for suspicious characters, and grew steadily more stressed out and frazzled as fears mounted of an imminent poisoning. The city sat thus on a powder keg for months, before finally erupting in what came to be known as “The Great Poisoning Scare of Milan”.
在这一皇室警告之后数月内，整个米兰紧张气氛与日俱增，深受惊恐的市民们不断警惕可疑人物，随着对投毒的恐惧逐渐加剧，他们压力程度不断攀升，身心俱疲。整座城市连续数月仿佛置于火药桶上一般，最终爆发了后来被称为“米兰投毒大恐慌”的事件。
It started on the night of May 17th, when some citizens reported seeing mysterious people placing what appeared to be poison in a cathedral partition. Health officials went to the cathedral, but found no signs of poisoning. The following morning, the Milanese woke to find that all doors on the main streets had been marked with a mysterious daub. Health officials inspected the daubs, but found nothing harmful in them, and concluded they were a prank by some mischievous actors with a sick sense of humor, getting some laughs out of the citizens’ fears.
该现象始于5月17日，当时一些市民报告说看到一些神秘的人将看起来像毒药的东西放在了一个教堂内的隔断墙中。卫生官员前往教堂，并未发现投毒迹象。第二天早上，米兰人想来发现主要街道两侧的门上都被使用一种奇怪膏泥状物质做了标记。卫生人员检测了这种物质，但并未发现任何有害成分，并得出结论说这只是一些有着病态幽默感、爱恶作剧的演员的恶作剧，只是为了嘲讽市民的恐惧而已。
Official reassurances were unavailing, however. Taking the mysterious daubs as a sign that the expected poison attack had finally arrived, the Milanese went into a citywide bout of mass hysteria, and began accusing random people of acts of poisoning, ranging from passersby on the streets, to various nobles, to Cardinal Richelieu of France or general Wallenstein, commander of the armies of the Holy Roman Empire in the then-raging Thirty Years War.
但官方的安抚并未奏效。米兰市民将这一神秘膏泥物质视为投毒活动已经开始的迹象，从而引发了全城集体癔症。他们开始随便指责某个人有投毒行为，从街上的路人，到不同贵族，到法国红衣主教 Richelieu或当时如火如荼的三十年战争中神圣罗马帝国军队统领 Wallenstein将军。
Among the early victims of the hysteria was an elderly man who was spotted wiping a bench in church before sitting down. A mob of crazed women accused him of poisoning the seat, and seized and violently assailed him in church. They then dragged him to the magistrates while continuing to beat him on the way, and ended up killing him en route.
这一集体癔症的最早受害者之中，包含一位年长者，当时他被发现在教堂里坐下之前擦拭了凳子。一群疯狂暴民般的女性质疑他在座位上投毒，而且在教堂内对其猛烈围殴，之后准备将其拖至当地法官处，但一路继续殴打，最终在路上将其打死。
More tragic was the case of a pharmacist who was accused of being in cahoots with the Devil when he was found with unknown potions. After prolonged torture and stretching on the rack, he changed his protestations of innocence to a confession of guilt, repeating whatever his torturers wanted to hear in order to end the pain. Admitting to being in league with the Devil and foreigners to poison the city, the pharmacist named other accomplices who were innocent of any crime. They in turn were arrested and tortured, and to end their suffering, they named yet more innocents, repeating the process. All were tried, convicted based on the confession extracted under torture, and executed.
而更具悲剧性的，是一位药剂师，当时人们发现他有未知的一些药剂，于是指控他与魔鬼勾结。在长时间折磨和四肢拉伸酷刑之后，他更改了无罪抗辩，承认自己有罪，重复着酷刑实施者想听到的任何话，只求停止折磨。在承认了与魔鬼和外国人勾结投毒这一城市之后，这一药剂师指认了其他完全没有犯过任何罪行的“同谋”们。他们陆续也被逮捕和折磨，为终止折磨，他们指认了更多无辜者，这一流程不断反复。所有人都被审判，被基于屈打成招的证词而被判有罪，并被处死。
As the mass hysteria and mounting insanity tightened its grip on the fevered city, a high number of Milanese stepped forward to accuse… themselves. Many went to the magistrates and voluntarily confessed to amazing deeds of the supernatural, describing meetings with the Devil, witches, sorcerers, and sundry practitioners of black magic, in which they plotted to poison the city. As reported, “The number of persons who confessed that they were employed by the Devil to distribute poison is almost incredible“. Many were executed based on their voluntary false confessions.
整个城市陷入癫狂，集体癔症愈演愈烈，荒诞离奇与日俱增，大量米兰人开始站出来，自首。很多人前往本地法官之处，主动承认自己做过的超自然行为，描述他们与魔鬼、女巫、巫师和各种黑魔法巫师会面密谋给整个城市投毒。有报道说：“自首说自己被魔鬼要求四处投毒的人的数量几乎令人难以置信”。很多人都因为这种自发给出的虚假认罪证词而被处死。
06 Lille Boarding School Witchcraft Hysteria 里尔寄宿学校巫术癔症
Antoinette Bourignon, a pious but mentally unstable seventeenth-century Frenchwoman, founded an all-girls boarding school in Lille, France. One day in 1639, upon entering the classroom, Madam Bourignon imagined that she saw a swarm of little black angels flying around the heads of the schoolgirls. Taking fright, she told the children to beware the devil, whose little black imps were buzzing all around them.
Antoinette Bourignon，17世纪时一位虔诚但精神不稳定的法国女性。她在法国里尔创办了一座寄宿女校。1639年的一天，在进入教室时，她觉得自己看到了一群黑色小天使盘旋在女生们的头上。深受惊吓，她告诉孩子们当心恶魔，恶魔的黑色魔精们正盘旋在她们周围。
The school headmistress developed an obsession with the little black imps hovering around her wards’ heads, and kept warning the schoolgirls daily to watch out for the Devil. Soon, the impressionable children came to believe that there were, indeed, little black demons flying all around them, and before long, Satan and satanic possession became almost the sole topic of conversation in the school.
她不断想着这一画面，几近偏执，每日不断警告学生们提防恶魔。很快，很容易受影响的孩子们就相信的确有黑色小恶魔飞在她们周围，很快，撒旦和恶魔附身就成为了学校里的唯一话题。
One of the girls ran away, too frightened to remain in a school infested with little black devils who might possess her at any moment, as Madam Bourignon and her staff never tired of warning the students. When she was brought back, she claimed not to have run away, but to have been carried away by the Devil, and that she was a witch and had been one since age seven.
Bourignon夫人和其他教职员不知疲倦地警告学生，其中一个女孩因太害怕继续待在这个充斥着黑色小魔鬼地学校，因此逃跑了。当她最终被带回来时，她说并非自己逃跑，而是被魔鬼带走了，她还说自己其实是一个女巫，从7岁时就是了。
Upon hearing that, about fifty other schoolgirls started having fits, and when they came to, joined in a “me, too!” rush, and claimed to be witches as well. In their clamor to confess, the children competed to outdo each other with the details of their supposed dark and fell deeds. Some claimed to ride on broomsticks, only to be topped by others claiming an ability to pass through keyholes, to be trumped in turn by those claiming to feast on the flesh of babies or to have attended the Domdaniel, or gathering of the demons.
听闻此言，其他大约50名女学生开始抽搐发作，当她们清醒过来时，她们争先恐后坦白“我也是”。在这种争先恐后的坦白中，孩子们互相竞争，看谁的邪恶行为细节更胜一筹。一些声称自己可以骑扫帚飞，但被一些孩子所声称的自己能够穿过锁孔的能力打败，这种能力又在据称吃婴儿肉的行为或参加了魔鬼聚会 Domdaniel的故事面前逊色。
A formal investigation was launched, and while some clergy and citizens of Lille were skeptical, the majority were of the opinion that the children’s confessions were valid, and that an example should be made by burning all fifty schoolgirls at the stake as witches. Their lives were only spared after some of the skeptical clergy, aghast at what was about to happen, insisted that the investigators dig in deeper, at which point they discovered what the school’s headmistress had done to fill the girls’ heads with thoughts of demonic possession. The children were absolved, and the blame was shifted to Madam Bourignon, who barely escaped punishment after the authorities, unsure of her sanity and tired of the whole affair, wound down and closed the investigation.
后来对这一事件展开了正式调查，尽管里尔的一些神职人员与市民对此表示怀疑，但大部分都认为这些孩子讲的是真实的，而且应该将所有50名女学生当作女巫被烧死，以儆效尤。她们之所以侥幸存活，是因为一些持怀疑态度的神职人员，惊愕于即将发生的悲剧，坚持让调查人员继续深挖，后来他们发现是女校长最初给孩子们大脑中灌入了恶魔附身的念头。孩子们被判无罪，责任被归咎于女校长头上，得益于当权机构不确定其精神正常性、厌倦了整件事，逐渐停止了这一调查，这位女校长才勉强逃脱惩罚。
07 Irish Fright of 1688 1688爱尔兰恐慌
From the start of his reign, resentment simmered against Britain’s Catholic King James II, as his mostly Protestant subjects decried and feared his perceived machinations to restore Catholicism to the realm. The resentment was kept under control, however, as the concerned populace reasoned that the elderly monarch had no son, and when he died, would be succeeded by his staunchly Protestant daughter Mary, and her even more staunchly Protestant husband, William of Orange.
自统治之初，对不列颠信奉天主教的英国国王詹姆斯二世的不满就一直暗流涌动，因为他的国民们几乎都是新教徒，他们认为他在谋划复辟天主教，因此对此表示谴责且感到恐惧。但这一怨恨情绪并没有爆发，因为人们认为国王无子嗣，当他去世，王室继承人就会是他的坚定的新教徒女儿玛丽和她更加坚定的新教徒丈夫William of Orange（奥兰治亲王威廉，即威廉三世）。
In 1688, however, king James unexpectedly had a son, removing at a stroke the option of running out the clock and waiting for the king’s eventual death and replacement by a Protestant successor. The simmering resentments came to a boil, setting in motion the Glorious Revolution that ended with the flight of King James II and his replacement on the British throne by his daughter Mary II and her husband William III.
但1688年，詹姆士国王突然有了一个儿子，民众之前的希望突然瞬间破灭。本来只是暗涌的民怨开始沸腾，由此爆发了光荣革命，国王詹姆斯二世出逃，玛丽二世与其丈夫威廉三世继任英国王座。
In the interregnum between James’ flight and his replacement by William and Mary, there was no government and fears of anarchy and lawless violence gripped the country. The greatest manifestation of those fears came to be known as the Irish Fright, which centered around an Irish army that James II had brought to England towards the end of his reign in an attempt to prop up his tottering throne. That army was greatly resented and feared by the English, many of whom recalled and most of whom believed the (sometimes exaggerated) stories of widespread Irish massacres and depravities against Protestants during the Civil War a few decades earlier.
在詹姆斯出逃之后、威廉和玛丽继任王座之前的一段无政府期间，当时国家无首，整个国家都陷于对无政府状态和无法律暴力行为的恐惧中。这些恐惧的最显著表现，就是后来被称为“爱尔兰恐慌”的事件。这一恐慌围绕着詹姆斯二世在统治期末为试图巩固摇摇欲坠的王位而带入英格兰的一支爱尔兰军队。英格兰人对这支军队充满仇恨和恐惧，很多人都重新回想起数十年前内战时期爱尔兰针对清教徒的大规模屠杀和恶劣行径（有时是夸大的），而且大部分人对这些回忆都对此深信不疑。
Many English people were thus primed to believe that the Irish were predisposed to savagery and capable of any atrocity. Against that backdrop, rumors began circulating in December of 1688 that the Catholic Irish forces quartered in England were readying themselves to fall upon the English to massacre, rape, and loot, to avenge the ouster of the Catholic king James. The Irish Fright began in earnest on the night of December 13th, 1688, when news arrived at Westminster that the ravening Irish were marching on London.
Fake news of preparations for atrocities were quickly followed by fake news of actual atrocities, as false reports that the Irish were putting English towns to the torch and massacring the inhabitants spread. The panicked English in London and surrounding shires rushed to arm themselves and form militias, erect fortifications, and patrol the countryside to guard against the imminent arrival of imaginary hordes of bloodthirsty Irish.
很多英格兰人因此都很容易相信爱尔兰人天性野蛮，能够实施各种暴行。在这一背景下，1688年12月，流言四起，说驻扎于英格兰的天主教派爱尔兰军队正准备对英格兰人进行屠杀、强奸和掠夺，以此为被驱逐的天主教徒詹姆斯国王复仇。
爱尔兰恐慌发生于1688年12月13日夜晚，当时，有传闻抵达威斯敏斯特，说爱尔兰军队正气势汹汹向伦敦行进。
随着关于爱尔兰军队在英格兰城镇放火杀戮的谣言不断传播，关于即将开展暴行的谣言也四处蔓延，紧随其后的就是关于各种已开展暴行的谣言。伦敦和附近郡深感恐慌的英格兰人急忙武装自己，成立民兵组织，建立堡垒，在乡间巡逻，以抵御即将到来的据说嗜血成性的爱尔兰人的攻击。
The Irish Fright subsided after a few days, and in hindsight, it seems that the rumors were begun, or at least spread, as part of an organized propaganda campaign by opponents of James II to further discredit his cause and to buttress that of William of Orange. When the latter landed in England at the head of a mostly foreign army, he was greeted not as an invader, but with raptures as a savior not only of the Protestant faith, but of the Protestants themselves from the feared depredations of the Irish.
数日之后，这种恐慌开始平息。事后看来，似乎这些谣言的产生，或至少其传播，不过是詹姆斯二世的对手们为了打击詹姆斯二世的计划，巩固奥兰治亲王威廉地位的、一次有组织的宣传活动。当威廉率领一支几乎由国外士兵组成的军队踏上英格兰土地时，他并未被视为侵略者，而是被视为可以保护新教和新教徒免受爱尔兰人邪恶行径伤害的拯救者而受到热烈欢迎。
08 Hammersmith Ghost Hysteria 哈默史密斯闹鬼癔症
In November of 1803, reports began circulating of ghost sightings in the Hammersmith district in west London. Many thought that the ghost was that of a recent suicide buried in Hammersmith’s churchyard, which was in line with a widespread contemporary belief that suicides should not be buried in consecrated grounds, because their souls would then find no rest there.
1803年11月，在西伦敦哈默史密斯区传闻四起说有些人看到过鬼。很多人都认为这一鬼魂属于埋葬在哈默史密斯教堂墓地的近期的一位自杀者。这也符合当时的普遍观念，即，自杀者不得被埋葬在教堂墓地，因为这样他们的灵魂会无法安息。
The ghost was described by all who saw it as being very tall and dressed all in white, with some witnesses adding horns and glass eyes to the description. Alarm at the sightings quickly grew to widespread panic, and then mass hysteria, as more and more people stepped forward to report that they had not only seen the Hammersmith ghost, but had been attacked by it as well. In response, fearful citizens took to arms and began patrolling the neighborhood.
所有称自己亲眼见到这一鬼魂的人表示，这一鬼魂很高，身穿白色，一些目睹者还表示有角和浑浊眼睛。震惊很快演变成了大规模惶恐，之后演变为集体癔症，越来越多人说自己不仅看到了哈默史密斯的鬼，而且还被他攻击了。随之，深感恐惧的市民们武装起来，开始巡逻住宅区。
On the night of January 3rd, 1804, one of the armed citizens, Francis Smith, was on patrol when he came across a bricklayer, Thomas Millwood, returning home from a visit to his parents while clad in the typical clothing of his trade: white pants, white shirt, and white apron. Leveling his shotgun at what he took to be the ghost, Smith shot Millwood in the face, killing him instantly.
1804年1月3日夜，其中一位携带武器的市民 Francis Smith在巡逻时看到一位砖瓦匠 Thomas Millwood，当时 Thomas 正在从父母家回自己家的路上，身穿他们行业通常穿的衣服：白色裤子、白色衬衫、白色围裙。Smith以为看到了传闻中的鬼，于是将枪瞄准他，当场将其射杀。
Smith was arrested and tried for willful murder. The presiding judge instructed the jury that establishing malice was not necessary for a conviction, and that all killings were either murder or manslaughter, absent extenuating circumstances that were not present here. Smith was duly convicted, then sentenced to death, which sentence was subsequently commuted to a year’s hard labor. As to the Hammersmith “ghost”, it later emerged that it was an elderly local shoemaker who wore the guise to frighten his apprentice.
Smith被逮捕并以故意谋杀而审判。主审法官告知审判员们并非只有证明有恶意才能定罪，如果没有可减罪情形，所有的杀戮要么是谋杀要么是非预谋杀人，且该案件中并无可减罪情形存在。Smith被依照法定程序定罪，然后被判处死刑，但这一判决后来被减刑为一年苦役。而至于传闻中的那个鬼魂，后来被发现，只不过是当地一个年长鞋匠身着白衣想要吓唬他的学徒而已。
09 The Halifax Slasher 哈利法克斯剃须刀伤人者
In 1938, the town of Halifax in England was gripped by a mass hysteria that lasted for about two weeks, during which an imaginary attacker fell upon local women. It all began on the night of November 16th, 1938, when two young female employees of a local mill were attacked by an unknown man, and rushed to a nearby house for aid, with blood streaming down their heads from a wound apparently caused by a razor blade.
1938年，英格兰哈利法克斯突然爆发了一次连续约两周的集体癔症，关于一位专门攻击当地女性的坏人的传闻令人人自危。一切都始于1938年11月16日夜晚，当夜，当地一座磨坊的两名年轻女工被一位神秘男性攻击，随后跑到附近一户人家求助，她们头上鲜血直流，伤口很明显是由剃须刀划伤导致。
Police were called, a report was filed, and disquietude spread throughout the community. As described by the Halifax Courier, the local newspaper: “Until the culprit is found and effectively dealt with there is not likely to be much peace of mind, not only [locally] but further afield. The affair has created a tremendous sensation and it has thoroughly upset the people“.
她们报了警，警方录了证词，整个社群开始骚动不安。如当地报纸《Halifax Courier》报道，“在罪犯被找到并被有效处理之前，几乎不可能有安宁之日，不仅本地，更远一些的地方也同样如此。这一事件已经引起巨大反应，让人惶惶不可终日。”
Five days later, another young woman in the vicinity reported being attacked by a man, who left her with a deep and clean-cut to her wrist, as if from a razor. Notwithstanding a clear description of the attacker, police had no luck finding him. When three days later another victim stepped forward, the authorities turned to the public for leads, and the local newspaper carried the headline: “£10 police reward for the arrest of Halifax ‘Slasher’“.
5天之后，附近另外一位年轻女性也报告说自己被一名男性袭击，手腕上留下一条很深很利落的伤口，像是用剃须刀划伤。尽管受害者清晰描述了袭击者，但警方依旧搜寻无果。当三天后另一位受害者报案后，当权机构转向民众寻求线索，当地报纸使用了这一大字标题：如逮捕哈利法克斯剃须刀伤人者，警方奖赏10英镑。
With news that a “Slasher” was in their midst, mass hysteria gripped the community. Even as Scotland Yard was called in to help the local police, businesses in Halifax and its surroundings shut down. The panic grew apace as more and more reports, and rumors of reports, all of them unfounded, came pouring of new attacks by the Slasher in surrounding towns.
在围绕着“剃须刀伤人者”的新闻发布后，迅速导致整个社群的集体癔症。甚至伦敦警察厅也被命令协助当地警方。哈利法克斯与周围的商家被关停。关于这位剃须刀伤人者在周围城镇袭击他人的报告和谣言大量涌现，尽管这些报告和谣言都毫无凭据，但恐慌迅速蔓延。
Out on the streets, wild-eyed vigilante groups were set up and started patrolling the region, which set upon and beat up many a stranger whom they came upon and mistakenly assumed was the Slasher. After a woman alleged that she had been attacked, a local Good Samaritan who had gone to help ended up being wrongly accused by vigilantes of being the Slasher, and was set upon by a mob. Only the intervention of police, who escorted him home, saved his life.
人们成立了民间治安队巡逻街道，这些治安队人员殴打了很多被他们误认为是那位剃须刀伤人者的陌生人。在一位女性宣称自己被袭击后，一位当地的好心人上前帮助，却被治安队员误认为是传闻中的剃须刀伤人者，于是如暴民般对其围攻。幸而有警察出面护送他回家，才让其免遭厄运。
The mass hysteria finally began to subside when, on November 29th, one of the “victims” of the Halifax Slasher admitted that his injuries had been self-inflicted. Other supposed victims soon confessed that they, too, had made up the attacks, and after 9 of 12 “victims” confessed to self-harm, Scotland Yard concluded that there had never been a “Halifax Slasher” and closed the investigation. Five locals who had filed false reports were arrested and charged, of whom four ended up doing time in prison for public mischief.
11月29日，一位“受害者”终于承认之前自己的伤是自己造成的，这一集体癔症才终于平息。其他所谓的受害者很快也坦白他们之前所报告的受袭经历也是编造的。在之前报告受袭的12名受害者中的9位都承认之前的伤是自己导致的之后，伦敦警察厅得出结论说从来没有“哈利法克斯剃须刀伤人者”，并终止了调查。五名谎报案情的当地人被逮捕并被起诉，其中4名因公共恶作剧罪而被关进监狱服刑。
10 The Taipei Slasher 台北剃须刀伤人者
For a fortnight in 1956, the population of Taipei in Taiwan was terrorized by rumors of a crazed slasher roaming the streets, surreptitiously slicing people with a razor blade as he brushed past them, then disappearing into the crowds and teeming throngs of the city. About twenty-one victims were reported, mostly poor and poorly educated people from the lower classes.
1956年有两周的时间，台北人心惶惶，因为有传言说有个人手持剃须刀，街头四处游荡，趁着从别人身边擦身而过时偷偷划伤他们，然后消失在人群中。据报告，约有21位受害者，大多是贫穷且教育程度极低的底层人群。
A typical example was that of an older gentleman who told police that he had been slashed by a stranger. After a medical examination revealed that the injury was caused by a blunt object and could not have resulted from a razor, the “victim” admitted that he did not really know how he had been injured, but assumed that he must have been slashed “because of all the talk going around“.
一个典型的例子是，一位年长的男士告诉警察他被陌生人划伤。在医生检查之后，发现这一伤口是钝器所伤，而非剃须刀。然后受害者承认他并不知道自己是怎么受伤的，只是觉得自己可能是被划伤的，因为大家都在说这件事。
Another example of a phantom slasher attack was caused by incompetent doctors who examined another older gentleman who showed up with a laceration on his wrist. When the patient casually mentioned that a stranger had brushed against him around the same time that he noticed the bleeding, the doctors put two and two together and came up with nine, attributed the wound to the feared slasher, and contacted police. A follow-up examination by more competent doctors revealed that the laceration was simply an old wound that had been reopened by scratching.
另一个例子则是拜一些能力较低的医生所赐。这些医生在检查一位年长男士手腕上的划伤伤口时，患者随口提及大约在发现流血的同时，有一个陌生人与他擦肩而过。这些医生很快将两件事联系在了一起，将这一伤口归咎于这位人人谈之色变的剃须刀伤人者，并联系了警方。后来一些能力较强的医生来检查，发现这一划伤伤口不过是一处旧伤被抓时重新裂开了而已。
In reality, there had never been a slasher, but simply a mass delusion or hysteria, amplified by sensationalist press reporting. After thorough investigation, police concluded that the “victims” had simply suffered the kinds of everyday accidental cuts and slight injuries that most people endure from time to time without hardly noticing. In the fevered atmosphere of the slasher scare, people simply attributed any rip in their clothes or scratch on their bodies to a surreptitious attack from the imaginary slasher. As the final report of the police investigation put it, out of twenty-one reported “victims” of the crazed slasher: “five were innocent false reports, seven were self-inflicted cuts, eight were due to cuts other than razors, and one was a complete fantasy“.
实际上，从来没有什么剃须刀伤人者，一切只不过是一次被夸大其词的媒体报道而放大的的集体幻觉或癔症。在充分调查后，警方得出结论说这些受害者的伤都不过是日常常见的，很多时候人们都察觉不到的意外割伤或其他轻伤。但在这种惶恐中，人们将衣服上的任何撕裂或身体上的任何擦伤都归咎于一个想象中的袭击者。如警方最终调查报告所述，在所报告的21位受害者中：“有5位受害者是虚假陈述但并非出于恶意；7位是自己导致的割伤，8位是并非剃须刀造成的割伤，1位是完全出于个人幻想。”
11 Tanganyika Laughter Epidemic 坦噶尼喀州笑声瘟疫
In 1962 a mass hysteria episode, in which people started laughing uncontrollably, began in the village of Kashasha on the western shore of Lake Victoria in Tanganyika (modern Tanzania) and quickly spread throughout the surrounding region. By the time it subsided months later, the mass hysteria had affected thousands of people, and led to the closure of 14 schools.
1962年，在坦噶尼喀州（现在的坦桑尼亚）维多利亚湖西岸一个名为 Kashasha的村落，爆发了一次集体癔症，在这一癔症中，人们无法停止大笑。这一癔症很快蔓延至周围地区。在数月后终于平息时，所影响人群已达数千人，而且导致了14座学校被关闭。
It all started on January 30th, 1962, when a girl in a missionary boarding school had a fit of anxiety-induced laughter, and started cackling uncontrollably. She was soon joined by two of her friends, and it was not long before the contagion had spread and engulfed the school. Within a short time, 95 out of the school’s 159 students were also laughing uncontrollably. It got bad enough that the schoolgirls were unable to concentrate, and the school was forced to shut down 6 weeks later.
一切始于1962年1月30日，一座寄宿教会学校里的一个女生因为焦虑而开始大笑起来，而且无法控制。很快她的两位朋友开始加入，不久之后，整个学校都被传染。短短时间内，整座学校159名学生中，有95名都开始无法控制地大笑。最后以至于这些女学生们根本无法专心，整座学校在6周后不得不关闭。
The afflicted students took their mass hysteria with them when they were sent back to their families, and within a short time of returning home, the contagion had spread from the schoolgirls to the surrounding community. Before long, students in other schools in the region were afflicted as well. The symptoms consisted in the main of recurring bouts of uncontrollable laughing and crying that lasted from a few hours to over two weeks, combined with a general restlessness, aimless running around, and the occasional resort to aggressive violence. Doctors could find no physical cause for the contagion.
这些受到感染地学生在被遣送回家后，也将这种集体癔症带回家中，在她们回家不久之后，这种大笑瘟疫就传染至周围社群。不久，其他地区学校地学生也被感染。症状主要包括：连续数小时或两周多持续陷入一阵阵不可控制的大笑或叫喊状态，而且普遍伴有不安、乱跑和偶尔暴力攻击等症状。医生也无法找到具体致病源。
By the time the mass hysteria subsided about a year later, 14 schools had closed down, and thousands had been afflicted. Subsequent investigation attributed the initial outbreak to stress among the schoolgirls, who found themselves in an alien environment within the missionary-run boarding school – the outbreak affected only the schoolgirls, without touching any of the teachers or staff. Beyond the school, the surrounding population was dealing with the stress and uncertainty of their country’s future, as Tanganyika had gained its independence only a month before the mass hysteria eruption.
截止于一年之后这一集体癔症终于平息时，已经有14所学校被关停，数千人曾被感染。后续调查将最初爆发原因归咎于学校女生的压力上。这些女生身处传教士开办的寄宿学校这一陌生环境中，经受着很大压力。这一集体癔症只影响了学校学生，并没有影响到任何教职员。在学校之外，周围人群都经受着压力以及国家未来的不确定性，因为当时坦噶尼喀州在这一集体癔症爆发一个月之前刚刚赢得独立。
12 McMartin Preschool Child Abuse Hysteria 麦克马丁幼儿园虐童集体癔症
In 1983, a mentally unstable mother accused Ray Buckey, an employee of the McMartin preschool in Manhattan Beach, California, of raping her child. She also went on to add that people in the day school had sex with animals, that Ray Buckey’s mother and preschool owner Peggy McMartin had perforated a child under the arm with a power drill, and that “Ray flew in the air”.
1983年，一位精神状况不稳定的母亲指控位于加利福尼亚曼哈顿海滩的麦克马丁幼儿园的一位名为 Ray Buckey的员工强奸了她的孩子。她还指控说这一日托学校的教职员有兽交行为、Ray Buckey的母亲，即幼儿园园长 Peggy McMartin曾经用电钻在一个孩子胳膊下面钻孔，而且Ray还曾在空中飞。
Police were skeptical, but nonetheless sent a letter to other parents at the school, asking them to question their children about abuses at the school. As parents talked to their children and other parents, other accusations of child sexual abuse began trickling in, and soon turned to into a flood of wild, weird, and increasingly incredible accusations of sexual abuse that stretched credulity amidst a mass hysteria of false accusations.
警方对此感到怀疑，但依旧给学校其他父母致信，让他们询问各自的孩子是否曾在学校受到虐待。当父母们询问自己的孩子，并与其他父母沟通时，其他关于性侵犯幼童的指控开始零散汇集，但很快便迅速爆发成为集体癔症，各种关于性侵的越来越离奇、难以置信的指控大量涌入。
Social workers were brought in to gather more information, and between a combination of incompetence and leading questions, the children’s accusations grew steadily wilder and more bizarre. In addition to being molested by Ray Buckey and his mother Peggy McMartin, the children alleged that they had been made to participate in satanic rites in which they were forced to drink the blood of a baby whom they had witnessed being sacrificed in church.
社工们被要求搜集更多信息，但由于能力不足以及各种诱导性问题，孩子们的指控越来越天马行空。除了被Ray Buckey和其母亲 Peggy McMartin猥亵之外，孩子们还称他们被要求参加邪恶的仪式，在这些仪式中他们被迫喝下在教堂中被献祭的一个婴儿的血。
The children also said that they saw witches fly, that they had been abused in a hot air balloon and in (nonexistent) tunnels beneath the preschool, and one child claimed to have been sexually molested by actor Chuck Norris. Other children added that, after being abused in secret rooms, they were flushed down toilets, then cleaned up and presented to their parents.
孩子们还说他们还看到女巫在天空中飞，他们还在一个热气球中和学校下面的隧道（不存在）中被虐待。一个孩子还说自己被演员 Chuck Norris猥亵。其他孩子还补充说，他们曾在一个密室里被虐待，然后被冲下马桶，然后被洗干净，再被交还给他们的父母。
Although the accusations were incredible, they came at a time when the country was in the grip of widespread fears of ritual sexual abuse of children, connected in some way to satanic worship and dark magic rites. With elections drawing near, ambitious Los Angeles District Attorney Ira Reiner unscrupulously sought to capitalize on the mounting public hysteria, and slapped Ray Buckey and his mother Peggy McMartin with 208 counts of child molestation.
尽管这些指控难以置信，但当时事件背景是，乡下地区的人普遍担心一些人会出于敬奉撒旦或举办黑魔法仪式之原因，对孩子性虐待。随着选举将近，想要大展政治宏图的洛杉矶地区检察官 Ira Reiner无所顾忌地决定利用这一越来越疯狂的大众癔症，针对Ray Buckey和其母亲 Peggy McMartin，提起了208宗儿童威胁罪公诉。
Buckey and his mother were arrested in 1984, and the investigation lasted for three years, until 1987. Mother and son were then put through a 3-year trial, which lasted from 1987 to 1990. It was the longest and most expensive criminal trial in American history. At its conclusion, a jury acquitted Peggy McMartin of all charges, while Ray Buckey was acquitted of 52 of 65 charges, with the jury deadlocked on the remaining counts 10 to 2 in favor of acquittal. Those charges were then dropped, and the mass hysteria and subsequent trial concluded without a single conviction.
Buckey与其母亲在1984年被逮捕，调查持续了3年，直至1987年结束。这一母子之后又经历了长达3年的审判。这是美国历史上耗时最长、最贵的刑事审判案件。最终，审判团判决 Peggy McMartin对所有指控罪名都无罪，而Ray Buckey对65项指控罪名中的52项无罪，而在剩余指控上，审判团10：2倾向于无罪，由此陷入僵局。这些指控最后也被撤销。由此，这一集体癔症和后续审判最终以完全无罪而告终。
Most people think of a “contagious” illness as something that can be spread by germs or physical means; however, you should never underestimate the power of the mind or its ability to seize control of the body when it feels threatened!
大多数人将传染疾病视为由病毒或实体因素而导致，但绝对不要低估大脑的能力，以及在感受到威胁时对身体的控制能力！
原文：
https://historycollection.com/12-historys-baffling-mass-hysteria-outbreaks/9/
https://www.scienceabc.com/eyeopeners/what-is-mass-hysteria.html
