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EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY ELECTIONS IN THE CARDIGAN BOROUGHS CONSTITUENCY* THE legislation of Henry VIII creating the borough constituencies of Wales was a masterpiece of vagueness. The original Act of 1536 stated that the borough member given to each Welsh county except Merioneth was to be chosen by the county town, but that the other boroughs were to contribute to his wages. A second Act of 1543 extended this franchise to the contributory boroughs. These towns, however, were not named, and the consequent discretion of the return- ing officers led to a variety of precedents. Certainly the presumed intention that the borough groupings were to consist of all the ancient boroughs of each county was rarely if ever fulfilled. In Cardiganshire the ancient boroughs were Aberystwyth, Adpar, Cardigan, Lampeter, Llanddewibrefi, and Tregaron. Evidence of the early composition of the Parliamentary constituency comes from a claim by the borough member for wages after the election of 1604. This shows that Cardigan, Aberystwyth, Tregaron, Trefilan, Lampeter, and Adpar had then comprised the constituency.1 By the later seventeenth century, when participation in the borough elections was regarded as a privilege rather than a burden, Trefilan had disappeared from the list. The Parliamentary borough elections always took place in Cardigan. The burgesses (or freemen) from the other boroughs had to attend there to approve the choice of member or to poll in contests. The mayor of Cardigan acted as returning officer, with power to accept or reject votes of doubtful validity, either at the poll itself or on a later scrutiny. Control of the county town was therefore of especial importance to aspiring members or their patrons. It lay in the Common Council of 13 members, instituted in 1653. Vacancies on this body were filled by co-option. The mayor was chosen at Michaelmas from among the Council by the general body of burgesses but since the mayors also chose the juries which presented (i.e., created) new burgesses, effective permanent power clearly lay in the self-perpetuating oligarchy of the Common Council. Control of the Council itself was a perquisite of the master of the Cardigan Priory estate. Sometime after the death in 1693 of Hector Phillips, who had been borough M.P. since 1679, this passed from the Phillips family to the Pryses of Gogerddan, who already ruled the borough of Aberystwyth. Here there was no oli- garchic council as in Cardigan, but the borough was nevertheless managed by the mayor, the town clerk, and a few other men who were *An address delivered at the postponed Winter Meeting of the Society at Aber- ystwyth, 13 January 1968.