Hysteria was defined very differently across history. Hippocrates described it as a 'suffocation of the womb', a wandering organ that caused symptoms as it moved through the body, and treatments included massage and oils. In the 18th century the physician George Cheyne reframed it as a nervous illness, and Anton Mesmer's animal magnetism promised cures through energy transfer. In the 19th century Silas Weir Mitchell's rest cure confined women to bed, and Jean-Martin Charcot photographed patients at the Salpêtrière. Sigmund Freud, who studied under Charcot, argued with Josef Breuer that symptoms came from mental trauma. During the First World War, thousands of soldiers with similar symptoms were diagnosed with shell shock. The term was removed from medical manuals in 1980.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.