Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 48.djvu/93

 (Vita S. Columbæ, i. 15). Except for these two references, what is known of Rhydderch comes from late sources. The Welsh Triads call him one of the three liberal princes of the isle of Britain (Myv. Arch. 2nd edit. ser. i. 8, ser. ii. 32, ser. iii. 30), and speak of the plundering of his court at Alclud by ‘Aeddan Fradog,’ i.e. Aidan, king of the Scots from 574 to 606 (ser. i. 46, ser. iii. 52). Iorwerth ap Madog, in the Venedotian edition of the laws of Hywel the Good, mentions Rhydderch Hael among the northern chiefs who attacked Arfon in the time of Rhun ap Maelgwn [q. v.] (Ancient Welsh Laws, ed. Owen, i. 104). In Jocelyn's ‘Life of St. Kentigern’ he appears as the devout king who, zealous for the progress of christianity among his people, invited the saint to the north from St. Asaph, and met him at Hoddam in Dumfriesshire, where Kentigern for a time established himself, moving in the course of a few years to Glasgow. According to Jocelyn, Rhydderch and Kentigern died in the same year. The date, however, is uncertain.

It is generally believed that Rhydderch was the victor in the battle of Arderydd, fought, according to Harl. MS. 3859 (Cymrodor, ix. 155), in 573. Skene has identified the site with the Knows of Arthuret, nine miles north of Carlisle (Four Ancient Books of Wales, i. 65), a suggestion generally accepted, in spite of the fact that its author habitually wrote ‘Ardderyd,’ to make it more plausible. Various theories as to the cause of the conflict have been put forward. Edward Davies believed it to have been a contest between christianity and druidism, the leading figures on either side being Rhydderch and Merlin (Mythology of the British Druids, pp. 469–474). Skene took it to be a struggle between a Roman and christian and a native and semi-pagan party (Four Ancient Books, i. 65). Rhys (Celtic Britain, p. 143) regards the main result of the battle as the shifting of power from Carlisle to Rhydderch's capital at Dumbarton. Several allusions to Rhydderch are to be found in the mediæval Merlin poems. The ‘Hoianau’ speaks of him as ‘guardian of the faith,’ who hunts with his dogs a mystic pig; the series of kings in ‘Cyfoesi Myrddin’ starts with him; in the ‘Afallennau’ the mystic apple tree is protected from the glance of his men. No importance is to be attached to the inclusion of Rhydderch in one of the lists of ‘saints’ in the Iolo MSS., p. 138, or to the statement in ‘Englynion y Beddau’ (Black Book of Carmarthen, fol. 32 b) that his grave is at Abererch (Carnarvonshire).

[Authorities cited.] 

RHYDDERCH, RODERICK, or ROGERS, JOHN (d. 1735), printer, was the son of Rhydderch Dafydd ap Gruffydd of Cwm Du, near Newcastle Emlyn. In 1708 he settled as a printer in Shrewsbury, and from that year until 1728 printed, according to Rowlands's ‘Cambrian Bibliography,’ eighteen books connected with Wales. He was himself an author, publishing translations of English religious tracts in 1716 and 1720, and ballads in 1717 and 1722. From 1716 until his death he edited a Welsh almanac, for which he occasionally wrote verse; there are poems by him also in ‘Carolau a Dyriau Duwiol,’ 1720, and in ‘Blodeugerdd Cymru,’ 1759. His most important work was, however, the ‘English and Welsh Dictionary’ published by him in 1725 (2nd edit. 1731, 3rd edit. 1737), which was the first undertaking of the kind. This was followed in 1728 by a Welsh grammar (in Welsh), abridged for the most part from that of Dr. John David Rhys [q. v.] Soon after this Rhydderch, as we learn from a letter he wrote to Lewis Morris [q. v.] in December 1729, gave up his business and moved to London. His last days were spent at Cattalhaiarn in the parish of Cemais, Montgomeryshire, where he died in November 1735.

[Rowlands's Cambrian Bibliography; Ashton's Hanes Llenyddiaeth Gymreig, pp. 198–206, 715–718.] 

RHYGYFARCH (1056–1099), wrongly called, and in Latin , clerk of St. Davids, was the eldest son of Sulien, bishop of St. Davids from 1072 to 1078, and from 1080 to 1085. Born in 1056, he was trained by his father, who maintained a school of great reputation at St. Davids, and appears to have spent most of his life in that place and at Llan Badarn Fawr in Cardiganshire, the home of the family. He is the author of the oldest extant life of St. David, that in Cotton. MS. Vesp. A. xiv, printed in Rees's ‘Cambro-British Saints,’ pp. 117–44. MS. A. 4.20, at Trinity College, Dublin, a Latin psalter, was written for Rhygyfarch's use by his brother Ieuan: it contains some verses by him. According to ‘Brut y Tywysogion’ and ‘Brut y Saeson,’ he was the most learned Welshman of his time, and yet had received no instruction except from his father. He died in 1099, at the age of forty-three, leaving a son Sulien, who became a clerk of Llan Badarn Fawr, a teacher, and a peacemaker between Welsh and English, and died on 22 Sept. 1146. The only ancient authority which makes Rhygyfarch a bishop is MS. C. of ‘Annales Cambriæ;’ but even if the text of that manuscript is cor-