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Thomas Parr
Thomas Parr
Birth: 28 February 1483?
Alberbury, Shropshire, English Kingdom (now UK)
Death: 16 November 1635
London, English Kingdom (now UK)
Age: 152 years, 264 days?
Country: EnglandENG,United Kingdom UK
Longevity myth

Thomas Parr (c.28 February 1565 (claimed 28 February 1483) – 16 November 1635) was an English longevity myth. He had become ingrained in English lore as "Old Tom Parr."

Biography[]

Records vary, but Parr was allegedly born around 1483 in the parish of Alberbury, Shropshire, English Kingdom (now UK). He existed and even thrived on a diet of "subrancid cheese and milk in every form, coarse and hard bread and small drink, generally sour whey", as the physician William Harvey wrote. "On this sorry fare, but living in his home, free from care, did this poor man attain to such length of days." He married Jane Taylor at the claimed age of 80 and had two children, both of whom died in infancy.

Tom Parr purportedly had an affair when he was more than 100 years old, and fathered a child born out of wedlock, for which he had to do public penance in the church porch. After the death of his first wife at the alleged age of 110, he married Jane Lloyd, a widow, at the alleged age of 122. They lived together for twelve years, with Jane commenting that he never showed any signs of age or infirmity.

National Celebrity and Death[]

As news of his reported age spread, 'Old Parr' became a national celebrity and was painted by Peter Paul Rubens and Anthony van Dyck. A portrait of Parr hangs at Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery, with an inscription which reads "Thomas Parr died at the age of 152 years 9 months" "The old old very old man or Thomas Parr, son of John Parr of Winington in the Parish of Alberbury who was borne in the year 1483 in Rayne of King Edward IV being 152 years old in the year 1635". The portrait was once in the collection of the Leighton family of Loton Park, which is in Parr's home parish of Alberbury.

In 1635, Thomas Howard, 21st Earl of Arundel, visited Parr and took him to London to meet King Charles I. By this time, Parr was reportedly blind and feeble. Charles asked what Parr had done that was greater than any other man, and the latter replied that he had performed penance (for his affair) at the age of 100.

Parr was treated as a spectacle in London, but the food and environment caused him to die after a few weeks in 14 November 1635, at the claimed age of 152 years, 264 days. The king arranged for him to be buried in Westminster Abbey on 15 November.

Gallery

Age Issues[]

An autopsy performed by physician William Harvey suggested he was only 70 years old when he died. The results were published in the book De ortu et natura sanguinis by John Betts as an attachment. Harvey examined Parr's body and found all his internal organs to be in a perfect state. No apparent cause of death could be determined, and it was assumed that Parr had simply died of overexposure because he had been too well fed. It is possible that Parr's records were confused with those of his grandfather. Parr did not claim to be able to remember specific events from the 15th century.

References[]

  • Parr, Thomas (called Old Parr) Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
  • Thomas Parr Westminster Abbey (Archived)
  • Thomas Parr NNDb.com
  • Long Livers a Curious History by Eugenius Philalethes, 1722
  • 'The Guide-Board to Health, Peace, and Competence', William Whitty Hall, D.E. Fisk and Company, 1872 (page 16)
  • Thomas Parr – the most long-lived Englishman, Shropshire Magazine, July 1967, pages 26-27
  • P. Lüth “Geschichte der Geriatrie” (1965), S. 153 + 154.
  • Old Tom Parr: The Man Who Lived to Be 152 Years Old History Of Yesterday, 28 October 2020
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