File NLW MS 24126B. - Antiquitates Parochiales, &c.

A notebook, 1809-1825, of the Rev. Peter Bailey Williams, Llanrug, containing a transcript, 1809, of Henry Rowlands's 'Antiquitates Parochiales' (pp. 1-107). The volume also contains a note (in Latin and English) concerning Mathew de Englefield, Bishop of Bangor's response to a writ of quo warranto (pp. 108-112); transcripts (in Latin and English) concerning the Merioneth Commission of the Peace for 1649 (pp. 113-119); part of a translation into English of the Statute of Rhuddlan of 1284 (pp. 121-122); 'A short account of Holyhead Church by L[ewis] Morris' (pp. 123-131); and a variety of transcripts and notes mostly concerning impropriations and other aspects of Church finances in the Dioceses of St Asaph and Bangor (pp. 132-182).
The 'Antiquitates Parochiales' was transcribed from a manuscript, apparently in the hand of Henry Rowlands, then in the possession of the Rev. J[ohn] Williams of Treffos, Anglesey (see p. 1); an additional section concerning Beaumaris, found in some manuscripts (see for instance NLW MS 115B), is not present. 'Antiquitates Parochiales' remained unpublished on Rowlands' death in 1723. The initial portions were first published in The Cambro-Briton, 2 (1820-21), 52-55 and 151-154, in an English translation by Peter Bailey Williams, possibly based on the present transcript (see the marks and marginal note on pp. 5 and 9, coinciding with the end points of the two articles), although the preamble (p. 1) differs significantly. The work was published in its entirety, in parallel Latin and English versions, in Archaeologia Cambrensis, 1 (1846), 126-135, 305-317, 389-396; 2 (1847), 6-13, 135-140, 215-222, 292-298; 3 (1848), 55-60, 164-169, 240-243, 291-301; 4 (1849), 36-44, 101-114, 176-193, 261-291. The names entered by Williams inside the covers and on pp. i-ii provide an informal, partial, index to the 'Antiquitates Parochiales'.