Family and Education

b. by 1532, 1st s. of Richard ap Rhys Dafydd Lloyd of Gogerddan by Elliw, da. and coh. of William ap Jenkin ap Iorwerth. educ. I. Temple 1550. m. (1) Elizabeth, da. of Thomas Perrot of Islington, Mdx. and Haroldston, Pemb., 2s. Thomas and Richard Price II 1da.; (2) Bridget, da. of James Price of Monaughty, Rad., 1s. suc. fa. Sept. 1553 or later.1

Offices Held

Bencher, I. Temple 1568-71.

J.p. Card. 1555, q. from 1559, Merion. 1573-9, many Welsh and marcher counties from 1579; custos rot. Card. 1559-79; commr. piracy, Card. 1565, armour 1569, musters 1570, victuals 1574, tanneries, Aberystwyth 1574; sheriff, Merion. 1579-80, Card. 1580-1; member, council in the marches of Wales by 1579-81.2

Biography

Price traced his descent directly from the Welsh clan which had established itself in Ceredigion by the eleventh century. His grandfather Rhys (from whom the family eventually took its surname), was the first to settle in northern Cardiganshire, and may have built the mansion of Gogerddan. The grandson at first called himself John ap Rhys Dafydd Llwyd, or more briefly John ap Rice, but by 1563 the surname had been fixed as Price or Pryse. The family estates, swollen by acquisitions from the former lands of Cymer Abbey in Merioneth, extended into that county, with some outlying property in Lleyn, Caernarvonshire; and intermarriage with the Pembrokeshire Perrots and the Radnorshire Prices (both parliamentary families), brought additional prestige, which was enhanced by John Price’s standing as a barrister. In 1574 he acquired from the Crown the lease of a water mill in the neighbouring borough of Aberystwyth, claimed by the burgesses as municipal property; Price therefore drew no profit, and the dispute dragged on into the time of his son Richard. At the musters of 1570 he was assessed, comparatively heavily, at ‘two light horsemen furnished’.3

In his last Parliament he was a member of the committee of the bill against Catholics, 25 Jan. 1581, and almost certainly the ‘Mr. Price’ who sat on committees considering weights and measures, 23 May 1572; sheriffs, 18 Feb. 1576, and the bill on fines and recoveries, 7 Mar. 1576.4

Price made his will when ‘sick in body’ on 13 May 1584, two days before his death. He asked to be buried in Llanbadarnfawr church, and made arrangements for the heir Richard and his daughter Elizabeth. James, the son of his second marriage, received most of his Merioneth estates, and went on to establish the family of Price of Ynys y maengwyn, Towyn, Merioneth. The will was proved 7 Dec. 1584. The Gogerddan family remained prominent in county politics and society till the present century.5

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: A.H.D.

Notes

• 1. Dwnn, Vis. Wales, i. 44; I.T. Recs. i. 249, 259; Burke, Peerage (Webley — Parry-Pryse).
• 2. CPR, 1560-3, p. 446; Egerton 2345, f. 47; Flenley, Cal. Reg. Council, Marches of Wales, 60, 69, 109, 132; P. H. Williams, Council in the Marches of Wales, 354-5.
• 3. Trans. Card. Antiq. Soc. i. 25; PCC 41 Watson; Exchequer, ed. E. G. Jones (Univ. Wales Bd. of Celtic Studies, Hist. and Law ser. iv), 47; Augmentations, ed. Lewis and Davies (Univ. Wales Bd. of Celtic Studies, Hist. and Law ser. xiii), 231; Flenley, 74.
• 4. CJ, i. 97, 106, 111, 120.
• 5. PCC 41 Watson; C142/208/242; DWB.