Family and Education

1st s. of Griffith Davies^† by Alice, da. of John ap Hywel ap Heilyn. educ. ?I Temple 1555. m. Lowry, da. of David Lloyd ap John Griffith of Botwnnog, Caern., 1s. 2da.

Offices Held

Escheator, Caern. 1566-7; dep. chamberlain N. Wales and clerk of the Exchequer, Caernarvon by 1575.

Biography

The Davieses of Caernarvon were a junior branch of an ancient Gwynedd family tracing its descent from Ednyfed Fychan, steward to Llywelyn the Great and ancestor of the Tudors. Davies’s father had settled in Caernarvon at the end of Henry VIII’s reign and had represented the borough in Parliament. Davies’s uncle was Thomas Davies of Caerhûn, bishop of St. Asaph 1561-73 and supporter of the Elizabethan religious settlement in his diocese. Davies himself married into a family which had connexions with the Earl of Warwick. His own estate did not amount to much: he was rated for subsidy at 20s.—the lowest grade in the borough, and just a quarter of the assessment on the more substantial burgesses—and he increased his holdings by a few small leasehold properties in the neighbourhood. His wife apparently inherited nothing under her father’s will. On the other hand his post at the Caernarvon Exchequer, which he no doubt owed to family contacts, gave him some standing in the neighbourhood. In 1576, for example, Lord Treasurer Burghley directed him to cooperate with Robert Puleston and Robert Turbridge, the Queen’s surveyor, in making a survey to settle a boundary dispute at Wig, near Aber, Caernarvonshire. He was still alive in 1600, but probably died soon afterwards.

Griffith, Peds. 162, 191; Arch. Camb. 1881, p. 83; Star Chamber, ed. Edwards (Univ. Wales Bd. of Celtic Studies, Hist. and Law ser. i), 30; E179/220/133, 147; 264/27; DWB, 153; Breese, Kalendars of Gwynedd, 130; Augmentations, ed. Lewis and Davies (Univ. Wales Bd. of Celtic Studies, Hist. and Law ser. xiii), 300; Cal. Wynn Pprs. 14, 29, 38, 118; PCC 26 Wrastley.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: A.H.D.

Notes