Muses' Garden of Delights; being songs set to Music,’ London, 1610. In 1812 a copy was in the library of the Marquis of Stafford, and Beloe printed six of its songs in his ‘Anecdotes,’ vol. vi. No copy of this book seems now accessible. Jones contributed the madrigal, ‘Faire Oriana, seeming to wink at folly,’ to Morley's ‘Triumphs of Oriana,’ 1601; and three pieces to Leighton's ‘Teares or Lamentacions of a Sorrowfull Soule,’ 1614. He is also one of the contributors to a manuscript collection of ‘Sacred Music for 4 and 5 voices’ in the British Museum (App. to Royal MS. 63).
Many of Jones's songs are poems of a high order of beauty; a few have been printed by Mr. A. H. Bullen's in his ‘Lyrics from Elizabethan Song Books,’ and in his ‘More Lyrics’).
[Grove's Dict. of Music, ii. 39, 40; Preface to Mr. A. H. Bullen's Lyrics from Elizabethan Song Books; Watt's Bibl. Brit. ii. 554; Cat. of Sacred Harmonic Soc. Lib.; Jones's Works in Brit. Mus.]
JONES, ROBERT (1810–1879), writer on Welsh literature, eldest son of Robert Jones, was born at Llanfyllin in Montgomeryshire on 6 Jan. 1810, and was educated at Oswestry school and at Jesus College, Oxford, where he matriculated in 1833 and graduated B.A. in 1837 (Foster, Alumni Oxon). After holding curacies at Connah's Quay and Barmouth, he was appointed in 1841 vicar of All Saints', Rotherhithe, and held the living until his death on 28 March 1879.
While still at Barmouth, Jones published a small hymn-book containing a selection of the best Welsh hymns, some of his own, and others by members of his family (Byegones, 2 April 1879); and he was a frequent contributor to the periodical literature of the day. On the revival of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, he was appointed in 1876 the first editor of ‘Y Cymmrodor,’ being the transactions of the society, and was the author of ‘The History of the Cymmrodorion.’ In 1864 he published a reprint of the first edition of ‘Flores Poetarum Brittanicorum: sef Blodeuog Waith y Prydyddion Brytanaidd,’ by Dr. John Davies of Mallwyd, and he also edited for the Cymmrodorion Society, but at his own expense, a facsimile reproduction of the original black-letter edition (1547) of William Salesbury's ‘Welsh-English Dictionary,’ London, 1876. The earlier volumes of the ‘Powysland Club Transactions’ contain several articles from his pen, the most important of which, perhaps, is a series on ‘The Minor Poets of Wales.’ His chief production is the ‘Poetical Works of the Rev. Goronwy Owen (Goronwy Ddu o Fon), with his Life and Correspondence … with Notes critical and explanatory,’ 2 vols., London, 1876, 8vo. Jones also commenced editing the ‘Poems’ of Iolo Goch [q. v.], but left the work unfinished, a portion only of the historical poems being published, with his annotations as supplements to ‘Y Cymmrodor,’ vols. i. ii. He was at one time Welsh tutor to Prince Lucien Bonaparte; his collection of Welsh printed books was one of the finest in the kingdom, and after his death it was purchased for the Swansea free library, where it is still preserved in its entirety.
[Montgomeryshire Collections, xiii. 97; Y Cymmrodor, iii. 126; Byegones relating to Wales for 2 April 1879; Minute Book of the Cymmrodorion Soc.; Athenæum, 5 April 1879, p. 438.]
JONES, ROWLAND (1722–1774), philologist, was the second son, according to Rowlands, of John Williams, but, according to the ‘Roll’ of the Inner Temple, of William Jones of Bachellyn, Llanbedrog, Carnarvonshire, where he was born in 1722. After receiving a good education, he spent some time as clerk in the office of his father, who was a solicitor, but he soon obtained a similar situation in London. He married a young Welsh heiress, and was enrolled as a member of the Inner Temple 26 Oct. 1751. He is usually described as of Broom Hall, near Pwllhelie, Carnarvonshire. He died in Hamilton Street, Hanover Square, London, early in 1774, aged 52. He left three children, two daughters, Elizabeth and Ann, and a son, Rowland. The son died a bachelor on 24 Nov. 1856, aged 84, and was buried at Llanbedrog.
Jones published:
- ‘The Origin of Language and Nations, Hieroglyfically, Etymologically, and Topographically defined and fixed, after the method of an English, Celtic, Greek, and Latin-English Lexicon. Together with an Historical Preface, an Hieroglyfical Definition of Characters, a Celtic General Grammar, and various other matters of Antiquity. Treated of in a Method entirely new,’ London, 1764, small 8vo. In this work the author attempts to prove that Welsh was the primeval language.
- ‘Postscript’ to last work, and often bound with it, London, 1767.
- ‘Hieroglyfic: or a Grammatical Introduction to an Universal Hieroglyfic Language; consisting of English Signs and Voices, with a definition of all the Parts of the English, Welsh, Greek, and Latin Languages, some Physical, Metaphysical, and Moral Cursory Remarks on the Nature, Properties, and Rights of Men and Things, and Rules and Specimens for Composing an Hieroglyfic Vocabulary of the Signs or Figures as well as the Sounds of
