Edward Lhuyd (1660-1709)

29 June - 21 August 2009

Born probably in 1660 in Loppington, Shropshire, Edward Lhuyd was brought up by his father, Edward Lloyd, in Llanforda, Oswestry. Edward Lloyd was a colourful character, and is usually portrayed as a dissolute, hot-tempered man seeking to avoid bankruptcy through loans and by a number of commercial ventures. He was, however, an informed horticulturalist who employed a professional gardener. His mother was Bridget Pryse of Glan-ffraid, a branch of the Pryses of Gogerddan, Ceredigion. His parents never married but both families acknowledged the boy.

Probably educated at Oswestry Grammar School, he received his early botanical training from his father’s gardener, the experienced and highly regarded Edward Morgan. He went up to Jesus College, Oxford, in 1682 and his closest associations would be in the university community thereafter. He was encouraged by Robert Plot, Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum and professor of chemistry, and succeeded him as Keeper of the Museum in 1691. About 1688 he adopted the Welsh form of his surname, which he normally wrote as Lhwyd, though on the title page of his Glossography he used Lhuyd.

Lhuyd developed the collections of fossils, shells and plants significantly. In 1693–4 he worked on revised descriptions of all the Welsh counties for Edmund Gibson’s new English edition of Camden’s Britannia and this inspired him to plan an ambitious natural and human history of Wales, Archaeologia Britannica. This was intended to be a study not only of the natural history of Wales but primarily of the history, languages and cultures of Britain’s first settlers, represented by the ‘Celtic’ speaking peoples of Britain, Ireland and Brittany. The project led to an extended research tour from 1697 to 1701.

During the tour Lhuyd published his study of British fossils and he had completed the first volume of Archaeologia Britannica by 1707. Administration of the Museum remained a responsibility but he continued to work on the next volumes. His health, however, deteriorated and he died at the Museum on 30 June 1709.

This exhibition will coincide with an international conference on Edward Lhuyd at the Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies from 30 June - 3 July 2009.