When exposed to the concentrated works of art, affected individuals experience a wide range of symptoms including physical and emotional (rapid heart rate and intense dizziness, that often results in and/or fainting), feelings of confusion and disorientation, nausea, dissociative episodes, temporary amnesia, and—in extreme cases— and temporary ‘madness’. The syndrome has also been applied to other situations where individuals feel totally overwhelmed when in the presence of what they perceive to be immense beauty (such as something in the natural world like a beautiful sunset). The effects are relatively short-lived and do not seem to require medical intervention.

The condition was named after the 19th-century French author Henri-Marie Beyle (1783-1842)—better known by his penname ‘Stendhal’—who at the age of 34 years (in 1817) described in detail his negative experiences (in his book Naples and Florence: A Journey from Milan to Reggio) of viewing Florentine art of the Italian Renaissance (and hence it’s alternative name as Florence Syndrome). When Stendhal visited Florence’s Santa Croce Cathedral and first witnessed Giotto's famous ceiling frescoes he became overly emotional about what he saw. Since Stendhal’s published account, there have been hundreds of cases of people experiencing similar effects—particularly at the famous Uffizi Gallery in Florence, and had often been referred to as the ‘Tourist’s Disease’. (I also noted that in online self-confessions that some people call it ‘Art Disease’). However, it wasn’t until 1979 that the condition was given the name Stendhal Syndrome by the Italian psychiatrist Dr. Graziella Magherini (who at the time was the chief of psychiatry at Florence's Santa Maria Nuova Hospital).

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Marie-Henri Beyle (23 January 1783 - 23 March 1842), better known by his pen name Stendhal, was a 19th-century French writer. Known for his acute analysis of his characters' psychology, he is considered one of the earliest and foremost practitioners of realism, as is evident in the novels Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black. Henri Marie Beyle (1783-1842) had a post in the Ministry of War and followed Napoleon's campaigns before retiring to Italy. Here, as 'Stendhal', he began writing on art, music and travel. He later wrote novels, literary criticism, and various biographical and autobiographical works.

She began to observe that many tourists visiting Florence appeared to be overcome with a range of symptoms including temporary panic attacks to seeming bouts madness lasting two or three days. Based on her recollection of reading Stenhal’s account, she named the condition Stendhal's syndrome. She later documented 106 similar cases admitted to the hospital in Florence between 1977 and 1986 in her 1989 book La Sindrome di Stendhahl. Her book described detailed accounts of people (including many Americans) who after viewing famous paintings or sculptures had severe emotional reactions leading to high anxiety and/or episodes. She believed the psychological disturbances were typically associated with “a latent mental or disturbance that manifests itself as a reaction to paintings of battles or other masterpieces”.

The 106 cases were classed into three types. Type I: Patients (n=70) with predominantly psychotic symptoms (e.g., paranoid psychoses).

Type II: Patients (n=31) with predominantly affective symptoms. Type III: Patients (n=5) whose predominant symptoms are somatic expressions of anxiety (e.g., panic attacks).She also reported that 38 percent of Type 1 individuals had a prior psychiatric history, while over half (53 percent) of Type 2 individuals did. To date, there are relatively few cases published in the academic literature. The most recent case I came across was from 2009. Timothy Nicholson and his colleagues published a case report in the journal British Medical Journal Case Reports. Their case involved a 72-year-old who developed a transient paranoid psychosis following a cultural tour of Florence. More specifically, they reported.