William Owen Pughe

William Owen Pughe (7 August 1759 – 4 June 1835) was a Welsh antiquarian and grammarian best known for his Welsh and English Dictionary, published in 1803, but also known for his grammar books and "Pughisms" (neologisms).[1]

William Owen Pughe
Portrait of W. Owen Pughe D.C.L., F.A.S (4671832)

Biography

He was born William Owen at Llanfihangel-y-pennant, Merionethshire, but the family moved to Ardudwy when William was about seven. He relocated to London in 1776. It was here that he got to know Owen Jones. Initially he worked as a clerk in a solicitor's office, subsequently becoming a teacher of Algebra in a girls' boarding school and also as a private tutor for the children of the wealthy.

In 1783 he joined the Society of Gwyneddigion, and soon began compiling his Welsh-English dictionary. Pughe's influence on Welsh orthography is now generally considered as negative.

In 1806, he inherited the estates of the Rev. Rice Pughe, of Nantglyn, Denbighshire, a distant relative. It was in gratitude to his cousin and benefactor that he added the name "Pughe" to his birth-name. After this he enjoyed a private income which meant that he was able to devote his whole time to literary and scholarly pursuits. He remained in London after 1815, when his wife died, but with his health declining he returned to live in Wales in 1825. He died ten years later in a friend's cottage beside Tal-y-llyn Lake.

Personal

In 1790 Pughe married Sarah Elizabeth Harper. The marriage produced two recorded daughters and one son, the noted scholar Aneurin Owen.

Works
  • The Cambrian Biography (1803)
  • Coll Gwynfa (translation of Paradise Lost) (1819)
  • Hu Gadarn (1822)

For Rees's Cyclopædia he wrote about history, but the topics are not known.

Sources
gollark: Yachts and vast mansions and such are *somewhat* wasteful.
gollark: They waste money in other ways and nobody cares much.
gollark: Why isn't some billionaire covering random regions of desert with megastructures? That would be cool.
gollark: I mostly think our current governance models are kind of awful but really hard to replace with anything which works better.
gollark: The Bible is something like a million words if I remember right, and I would have to filter out the irrelevant historical things and arbitrary rules if I wanted to read it as philosophy or something. Strictly speaking, I have time but not the attention span or any actual desire.

References
  1. "The Invention of Tradition", Prys Morgan


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