Bodily sensations are paramount to experiencing, as has been argued by Willemijn Ruberg.[1] The phenomenological approach that inspires the history of experience for Ruberg enriches our understanding of how the body was perceived and experienced, especially in the premodern past.[2] To arrive at how perceptions and sensations become experiences through the body in historical contexts, this entry will argue that we need to go beyond individual bodies and consider bodies in interaction.

Perceptions of the body in the premodern Western past share a striking feature with contemporary neuroscientific ideas: the mind and body are intrinsically interlinked and dependent on each other.[3] In premodern terms, this meant that sensual impressions and emotional sensations were physical because they were created through bodily practices and were experienced through bodily processes. Neuroscience emphasises that the human brain is malleable and changes as a result of bodily practices in cultural surroundings. This means that feelings and sensations are relational to the cultural context in which the body is situated.