| • Science | • People | • Locations | • Timeline |
Williams was born in the parish of Llanfair-ar-y-bryn , Carmarthenshire, early in 1717. His family were nonconformists. He was educated locally and intended to become a doctor. This changed when he had a religious conversion while listening to Howell Harris, the evangelical reformer, preaching in Talgarth in 1737. He took deacon's orders in the Church of England in 1740 and was appointed curate to Theophilus Evans (1693-1767) in the parishes of Llanwrtyd, Llanfihangel Abergwesyn and Llanddewi Abergwesyn. Because of his Methodist activities he was refused ordination as a priest and from then on he committed himself entirely to that movement. He travelled throughout the country preaching and establishing seiadau, local fellowships of Methodist people, for the converts he won. He died in 1791.
In common with many other Welsh people whose names are less than unique, he was known by the nicknameA nickname is a short, clever, cute, derogatory, or otherwise substitute name for a person or thing's real name, (for example, Nick is short for Nicholas . As a concept, it is distinct from both pseudonym and stage name, although there may be overlap in t or bardic nameA bardic name is a pseudonym used, in Wales, by poets and other artists, especially those involved in the eisteddfod movement. The term bard originally referred to minstrels and poets of the middle ages, who might be itinerant or attached to a wealthy hou of Pantycelyn, this being the name of the farm in the parish of Llanfair-ar-y-bryn where he lived for most of his life.
His virtuosity as a hymnwriter also earned him another nickname Y pêr ganiedydd (=The sweet singer).
He wrote some of his work in EnglishThe English language is a West Germanic language, originating from England. It is the third most common "first" language (native speakers), with around 402 million people in 2002. English has lingua franca status in many parts of the world, due to the mil, but most of his work is written in WelshWelsh redirects here, and this article describes the Welsh language. For other meanings, see Wales (disambiguation). Welsh Cymraeg y Gymraeg , not to be confused with the Welsh dialect of English, is a Brythonic branch of Celtic spoken natively in the wes. He published his first work in 1744, the first part of Aleluia, a collection of hymns. This was followed by further collections:
He also published two collections of English hymns: