Dr Ffion M Jones MA, PhD

Research Fellow

Ffion Mair Jones works on eighteenth-century research projects at the Centre. Most recently, she participated in ‘Curious Travellers: Thomas Pennant and the Welsh and Scottish Tour (1760–1820)’, where she worked on transcribing and creating digital editions of parts of Pennant’s extensive and remarkable correspondence. She has a particular interest in Pennant’s Welsh correspondence and in his correspondence with the print-collector Richard Bull; see bibliography for links to online editions of these on ‘Curious Travellers editions’. Further interests include Pennant’s early correspondence; his Continental correspondence and 1765 tour to the Continent; the making of British Zoology; Pennant’s artists; and the reception of Pennant in Welsh-speaking contexts up to the beginning of the 20th century.

Ffion also worked on ‘Iolo Morganwg and the Romantic Tradition in Wales, 1740–1918’, where she co-edited with Geraint H. Jenkins and David Ceri Jones the three-volume Correspondence of Iolo Morganwg (Cardiff, 2007) and wrote a monograph on Iolo’s marginal notes in books and on his correspondence, ‘The Bard is a Very Singular Character’: Iolo Morganwg, Marginalia and Print Culture (Cardiff, 2010).  

Her contribution to the ‘Wales and the French Revolution’ project included a volume of ballads produced between the early years of the Revolution and the end of the Napoleonic wars, Welsh Ballads of the French Revolution 1793–1815 (Cardiff, 2012); several articles on Welsh ballads; and an edition of an interlude by Huw Jones, Glan Conwy, recounting the history of the Revolution from a Welsh perspective.

Ffion’s interest in Welsh correspondence of the eighteenth century led to the creation of a database of the Morris correspondence (1725–86). Other interests include the popular genre of the interlude in Wales. Here, her focus has been on historical material relating to the British Civil Wars of the seventeenth century (see the edition of Huw Morys, Y Rhyfel Cartrefol (Bangor, 2008)) and the American and French revolutions, and on chronicle renditions of stories such as that of King Lear. Alongside this, she has an interest in questions of literacy in the eighteenth century as evidenced in Welsh ballads; and in the Welsh language usage displayed in the Morris letters, in particular with reference to the translation of Enlightenment vocabulary into Welsh.

Merioneth Historical and Record Society: co-editor of the Journal

Teaching areas relate to Celtic religions in the Iron Age and Roman period; and perceptions of the Otherworld in medieval Welsh and Irish literature.

Modules taught:

Celtic Otherworlds (MA module)

Celtic Religions (BA module)

MA supervision: transgression, loss and grief in Medieval Welsh and Irish poetry

Otherworld figures in medieval to early modern Irish, Scottish and Welsh literature and folklore

Eighteenth-century correspondence and correspondence networks, with a focus on Welsh material; implications and potential of network analysis for reading correspondence; scientific and natural history correspondence; representing natural history and landscape in art; antiquarian circles in eighteenth-century Britain; Welsh ballads and folk-plays; translation into Welsh in the eighteenth century

Welsh correspondences of the eighteenth century – Iolo Morganwg, Thomas Pennant, Morrises of Anglesey; natural history and antiquarian circles; Thomas Pennant’s artists, including Moses Griffith; Welsh ballads and folk-plays, with emphasis on historical interludes

with Luca Guariento, ‘Mynegai i Ohebiaeth Morrisiaid Môn, 1725–1786’, at http://morrisiaid.colegcymraeg.ac.uk (2021)

‘Welsh circles’ [letters relating to Wales among Thomas Pennant’s correspondence], Curious Travellers editions (2019–)

‘William Morris a Thomas Pennant: cysylltiadau cyffredin’, Trafodion Anrhydeddus Gymdeithas y Cymmrodorion, 25 (2019), 23–48

‘The correspondence of Thomas Pennant and Richard Bull (1773–1798)’, Curious Travellers editions (2019)

‘A new look at the correspondence of Thomas Pennant and Richard Bull (1773–1798)’, Curious Travellers editions (2019)

Welsh Correspondence of the French Revolution 1789–1802 (Aberystwyth: Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, 2018

Y Brenin Llŷr a Baledi’r Rhyfelwraig (Bangor: Prifysgol Bangor, 2016)

‘Iolo Morganwg a llythyr y “Colegwyr” ’, Llên Cymru, 37 (2015), 35–44

Y Chwyldro Ffrengig a’r Anterliwt: Hanes Bywyd a Marwolaeth Brenin a Brenhines Ffrainc gan Huw Jones, Glanconwy (Caerdydd: Gwasg Prifysgol Cymru, 2014)

‘Y faled ym Meirionnydd yn y ddeunawfed ganrif’, Cylchgrawn Cymdeithas Hanes a Chofnodion Sir Feirionnydd, XVIII, rhan I (2014), 26–49

‘Welsh balladry and literacy’, in David Atkinson and Steve Roud (eds.), Street Ballads in Nineteenth-Century Britain, Ireland, and North America: The Interface between Print and Oral Traditions (Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), pp. 105–26

‘ “Brave Republicans”: representing the Revolution in a Welsh interlude’, in Mary-Ann Constantine and Dafydd Johnston (eds.), ‘Footsteps of Liberty and Revolt’: Essays on Wales and the French Revolution (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2013), pp. 191–211

‘ “English men went head to head with their own brethren”: the Welsh ballad-singers and the War of American Independence’, in John Kirk, Michael Brown and Andrew Noble (eds.), Cultures of Radicalism in Britain and Ireland: Number 3 (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2013), pp. 25–47

‘ “The silly expressions of French revolution …”: the experience of the Dissenting community in south-west Wales, 1797’, in David Andress (ed.), Experiencing the French Revolution (Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2013), pp. 245–62

‘ “To know him is to esteem him”: Ifor Ceri (1776–1829)’, Casgliadau Maldwyn, 99 (2011), 53–82

‘ “A’r ffeiffs a’r drums yn roario”: y baledwyr Cymraeg, y Milisia a’r Gwirfoddolwyr’, Canu Gwerin, 34 (2011), 18–42

Welsh Ballads of the French Revolution (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2012)