ABSTRACT

Melancholy was a fashionable disease in England around 1600. It was notably suffered by disaffected courtiers including John Dowland, who composed music designed to alleviate this condition. Melancholy was a “passion” (which we would call an emotion) caused by depletion of the animal spirits that flowed through the nerves. But it also had a cognitive dimension, since these spirits connected the body to the mind and soul. I review the contrasting theories about the causes of music’s power over the passions, arguing that most of these came from the Italian natural magic tradition, which had its roots in Antiquity. This provided a vocabulary to articulate musical experiences and also offered an understanding of how music contributes to well-being.