diff --git a/quartz/components/renderPage.tsx b/quartz/components/renderPage.tsx
index 3ebfe4879..2c1bf5e75 100644
--- a/quartz/components/renderPage.tsx
+++ b/quartz/components/renderPage.tsx
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@ import { visit } from "unist-util-visit"
 import { Root, Element, ElementContent } from "hast"
 import { GlobalConfiguration } from "../cfg"
 import { i18n } from "../i18n"
+import { styleText } from "util"
 
 interface RenderComponents {
   head: QuartzComponent
@@ -68,6 +69,7 @@ function renderTranscludes(
   cfg: GlobalConfiguration,
   slug: FullSlug,
   componentData: QuartzComponentProps,
+  visited: Set<FullSlug>,
 ) {
   // process transcludes in componentData
   visit(root, "element", (node, _index, _parent) => {
@@ -76,6 +78,30 @@ function renderTranscludes(
       if (classNames.includes("transclude")) {
         const inner = node.children[0] as Element
         const transcludeTarget = (inner.properties["data-slug"] ?? slug) as FullSlug
+        if (visited.has(transcludeTarget)) {
+          console.warn(
+            styleText(
+              "yellow",
+              `Warning: Skipping circular transclusion: ${slug} -> ${transcludeTarget}`,
+            ),
+          )
+          node.children = [
+            {
+              type: "element",
+              tagName: "p",
+              properties: { style: "color: var(--secondary);" },
+              children: [
+                {
+                  type: "text",
+                  value: `Circular transclusion detected: ${transcludeTarget}`,
+                },
+              ],
+            },
+          ]
+          return
+        }
+        visited.add(transcludeTarget)
+
         const page = componentData.allFiles.find((f) => f.slug === transcludeTarget)
         if (!page) {
           return
@@ -196,7 +222,8 @@ export function renderPage(
   // make a deep copy of the tree so we don't remove the transclusion references
   // for the file cached in contentMap in build.ts
   const root = clone(componentData.tree) as Root
-  renderTranscludes(root, cfg, slug, componentData)
+  const visited = new Set<FullSlug>([slug])
+  renderTranscludes(root, cfg, slug, componentData, visited)
 
   // set componentData.tree to the edited html that has transclusions rendered
   componentData.tree = root