Morys, Lewis

(1700-1765)

   He was the eldest of the three brothers known as "Morrisiaid Môn" (the Morrises of Anglesey), sons of Richard Morys and grandfather of Sir Lewis Morris (see entry). He was born at Tyddyn Melus in the parish of Llanfihangel, Monmouthshire, but was brought up in Penrhos Llugwy, Anglesey, where education was ordinary and English was a foreign language. He worked as a land surveyor and pioneered a survey of the ports and coastline of Wales. His Plans of Harbors, Bars, Bays and Roads in St. George's Channel, which included 25 detailed maps, was published in 1748. In Holyhead, he set up the first printing press in North Wales for the purpose of printing Welsh books and popularizing Welsh literature. He was an authority on the Welsh language and when he died at his home in Goginan, Dyfed, he was working on a new edition of John Davies's (Welsh) Dictionarium Duplex (1632) and a collection of Welsh proverbs. He was the author of a large body of light-hearted prose and poetry. Some of his poems: "Poem of the Frost and Snow," "Soul-Music," "The Fishing Lass of Hakin," "The Miner's Ballad."

   Sources: Anglo-Welsh Poetry, 1480-1980. Raymond Garlick and Roland Mathias, eds. Poetry Wales Press, 1984. Anglo-Welsh Poetry, 1480-1990. Raymond Garlick and Roland Mathias, eds. Poetry Wales Press, 1993. Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. Lewis Morris, "Tlysau yr Hen Oesoedd." (http://www.gtj.org.uk/en/item1/14571). Selections from the Works of Sir Lewis Morris. Kegan Paul, 1897. The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Oxford Book of Welsh Verse in English. Gwyn Jones, ed. Oxford University Press, 1977.