Welsh Journals

Robert ap Huw: A Wanton Minstrel of Anglesey NIA POWELL Among the criminal records of the Court of Great Sessions in Denbighshire which were held in the town of Denbigh before Sir Richard Lewkenor in July 1600 are depositions concerning a remarkable case.1 The case concerned events which occurred during the autumn of 1599 and the spring of 1600 in the parishes of Llanfair Dyffryn Clwyd, Llanelidan, Derwen, Gwyddelwern and Corwen, an area straddling the southern end of the Vale of Clwyd and northern Edeimion and the border between the two counties of Denbighshire and Merioneth. On the face of it the case presented little that was special; a man had been accused of committing several offences. The first complaint made against him, and the start of the trouble, was that he had during the previous autumn abducted from her father's house, and without his consent, the daughter of Ieuan ab Ithel, a minor gentleman asso- ciated with Plas Llelo in the parish of Gwyddelwern in Merioneth.2 The accused had been staying with Ieuan ab Ithel, probably at Plas Llelo, when he had thus abused his hospitality, and for this moral offence he had been brought before the bishop of Bangor's Court at Llanelidan during the second week of November 1599.3 Ieuan also accused him of further offences, claiming that he had feloniously taken from the house some linen and, significantly, 'writtinges', or manuscripts.4 The depositions state that the offender had been indicted for taking these things at the court of quarter sessions held at Ruthin during April 1600.5 During that April, further charges were brought against him by a Corwen gentlewoman, Margaret vch David of Trewyn, who claimed that he had taken from her home, during the night of 9 April 1600, three brazen vessels, a coverlet, a blanket and a petticoat.6 He was caught at Plas Einion, Llanfair Dyffryn Clwyd and imprisoned to answer the burglary charge at the 'tower' in Clwyd Street, Ruthin. On the night of Saturday 10/11 May,