Welsh Journals

out to use and enjoy both they themselves and their ancestors and pre- decessors Burgesses of the aforesaid Burgh their liberties and freedoms from the time of their grant and confirmation aforesaid have been strictly accustomed to use and enjoy. In testimony of which thing we have caused these our letters patent to be made Witness myself at Leicester on the 21st day of February in the 4th year of our reign. We also the afore- said charters and all and singular ratifications possessions and grants in them contained for us and our heirs as far as in us lieth accept and approve and to our well beloved Burgesses of the aforesaid town and to their heirs according to the tenor of these presents do grant and confirm as the afore- said charter in itself strictly testifies Of which witness the King at West- minster on the 20th day of November [1258]'. The source of much of the political power wielded by the county families down to the nineteenth century was attributable as much to their influence in those boroughs such as Aberystwyth which-together with Adpar, Cardigan, Lampeter and Tregaron, formed a parliamentary constituency, as to the extent of their real estate. As we shall see later the amount of strife which existed between the lead- ing families depended largely on their ability or inability to 'control' the electorate, unless, of course, the rival party proved sufficiently accommodating. A satis- factory arrangement was sometimes arrived at in a case where a particularly influential squire had no political ambitions and his son and heir was yet a minor. Otherwise we find that each family in turn strove hard to acquire burgages within the boroughs and to secure thereby for their tenants the right to vote in municipal and parliamentary elections. The imposition of law and order was the prerequisite of any attempt (be it Plantagenet or Tudor) to set up an effective central government, and this in turn depended largely on the degree of co-operation given by the local uchelwyr, who filled the more important appointments in exchange for certain perquisites of office. The continual struggle for local power between neighbouring families in Cardigan- shire, as elsewhere, sometimes developed into serious feuds which occasionally resulted in the violent death of one or other of the participants. The old order of vengeance (founded on the principle of an eye for an eye) no doubt died hard among the aggrieved, but gradually gave way to the less satisfying but more ethical con- ditions enforced by a legal settlement. Such an incident, with the consequent security measures adopted, is revealed in the following bond (No. 1582) between members of the Prothe and Glays families. Although the Ieuan ap David Rethergh [Rhydderch] mentioned therein is not satisfactorily identified, he may have been one of the Gogerddan family. The document, which is one of the earliest in English contained in the collection, is particularly interesting for the light it throws on some of the customs and methods of legal settlement in fifteenth century Wales. 'To all tho that thys wrytyng endented trip'tit schall se other here Wylliam Thomas Knyght and Gruff' Nicholas esquier senden gretyng and for as muche as dyv'ses dissenciones discord and debats before thys tyme have