The Lockdown Chronicles 3: Roger

Click on the image below to read the comic strip in full size. Sources and references on this post under the comic strip below.

Roger Crab (1621 – 11 September 1680) was an English soldier, haberdasher, herbal doctor and writer, best known for his ascetic lifestyle which included vegetarianism and veganism. According to the Hillingdon archives, Crab “fought for Parliament in the Civil War, suffering a severe head wound. After the war he opened a haberdashery in Chesham. Following a mystical experience, he sold his shop and gave all his money to the poor. Moving to Ickenham, he began an ascetic life, dressing in sack cloth and eating vegetables, dock leaves and grass. He said he could live on three farthings a week.” Crab wrote his autobiography while living in Ickenham. He titled it The English hermite, or, Wonder of this age… etc (London, 1655). [Wikipedia entry]

Source image: Portrait of Roger Crab, the vegetarian… etching, London: 1813. British Museum 1920,1211.451 AN1613130620. Image licensed CC-BY-NC-SA © The Trustees of the British Museum.

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The Lockdown Chronicles is a series of periodical comic strips made at night (in candlelight!) adapting and reusing openly-licensed or public domain items from online digital collections. Publication and tweetage are scheduled in advance. Historical sources are adapted and updated for the current pandemic; please refer to each strip’s references on each post for further context.  Catch up with the series at https://epriego.blog/tag/the-lockdown-chronicles/.