Canities subita, also called Marie Antoinette syndrome or Thomas More syndrome, is an alleged condition of hair turning white overnight due to stress or trauma. The trivial names come from specific cases in history including that of Queen Marie Antoinette of

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

whose hair was noted as having turned stark white overnight after her capture following the ill-fated flight to Varennes during the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...

. An older case of Sir

Thomas More Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), venerated in the Catholic Church as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, judge, social philosopher, author, statesman, and noted Renaissance humanist. He also served Henry VIII as Lord ...

's hair turning white the night before his beheading has also been recorded. Although a number of cases of rapid hair greying have been documented, the underlying patho-physiological changes have not been sufficiently studied.

Causes

The syndrome has been hypothesized to be a variant of

alopecia areata Alopecia areata, also known as spot baldness, is a condition in which hair is lost from some or all areas of the body. Often, it results in a few bald spots on the scalp, each about the size of a coin. Psychological stress and illness are pos ...

diffusa or

autoimmune In immunology, autoimmunity is the system of immune responses of an organism against its own healthy cells, tissues and other normal body constituents. Any disease resulting from this type of immune response is termed an "autoimmune disease". ...

non-scarring hair loss that selectively affects all pigmented hairs, leaving only the white hair behind. Marie Antoinette syndrome is caused by high levels of emotional stress, which, in turn, causes less pigmentation of the hair. These form the basis of most uses of the idea in fictional works. It has been found that some hairs can become colored again when stress is reduced. One study with experiments on mice found that stress caused white hair even if the immune system was suppressed (ruling out

auto-immune In immunology, autoimmunity is the system of immune responses of an organism against its own healthy cells, tissues and other normal body constituents. Any disease resulting from this type of immune response is termed an "autoimmune disease". P ...

response) and if the glands producing cortisol were removed. The study concluded that over-activation of the sympathetic nervous system was causing stem cells to stop producing

pigment cells Melanocytes are melanin-producing neural crest-derived cells located in the bottom layer (the stratum basale) of the skin's epidermis, the middle layer of the eye (the uvea), the inner ear, vaginal epithelium, meninges, bones, and heart. M ...

in hair follicles.

History

The earliest surviving recorded claim of sudden whitening of the hair is represented in the

Talmud The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law ('' halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the ce ...

, by a story of a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

scholar who, at the age of 17 years, developed white hair locks due to overwork. Contemporary cases of accelerated hair-whitening have been documented, as with bombing victims in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, and in a case covered in the medical journal ''

Archives of Dermatology ''JAMA Dermatology'' is a monthly peer-reviewed medical journal published by the American Medical Association. It covers the effectiveness of diagnosis and treatment in medical and surgical dermatology, pediatric and geriatric dermatology, and on ...

'' in 2009.

References

{{Diseases of the skin and subcutaneous tissue Autoimmune diseases Conditions of the skin appendages

Syndrome A syndrome is a set of medical signs and symptoms which are correlated with each other and often associated with a particular disease or disorder. The word derives from the Greek language, Greek σύνδρομον, meaning "concurrence". When a sy ...

Syndromes