Late Middle Ages (14th century)
Feast: August 16
A French pilgrim who caught the plague nursing the sick — and was kept alive in quarantine by a dog that brought him bread every day.
Roch gave away his inheritance in Montpellier, dressed as a pilgrim, and walked to Italy. When he arrived, the plague was everywhere. Instead of turning around, he walked into the hospitals. He nursed the sick in Acquapendente, Cesena, and Rome, and people credited him with miraculous cures — until he caught the plague himself. Too sick to help anyone and not wanting to be a burden, he dragged himself into the woods outside Piacenza to die alone. That is when the dog showed up. A hunting hound from a nearby estate started bringing Roch bread every day, and the dog's owner, curious about where his dog kept disappearing to, followed it and found the dying pilgrim. He nursed Roch back to health. Roch eventually recovered and walked home to Montpellier, but he was so changed by illness that no one recognized him. He was arrested as a spy and died in prison around 1327, probably in his early thirties. Only after his death was he identified. His cult spread wildly across Europe during later plague outbreaks, and he is almost always depicted with a dog at his feet and a wound on his thigh.