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This study explores the connexions that can be drawn between emotions, madness and the family through a discussion of relevant historiographical debates, aiming to propose a critical reflection on the possibilities of introducing emotions as a category of historical analysis. It examines the debate that placed the family and the domestic space at the centre of the analysis of the history of madness, a turn that resulted in the introduction of the dimension of experience. Building on this debate, the study suggests an approach to the history of madness that considers the critical role attributed and played by emotions in the interpretation, experience and responses to mental deviance, reflecting on the interconnections between the local and the transnational dimension. To approach the history of madness through the lens of emotions provides a valuable way to grasp the contextual and relational aspects behind the social configuration of the boundaries between sanity and insanity.