Career
His poetical output is more considerable and includes the poem entitled Cerdd Dic Siôn Dafydd (Dic Siôn Dafydd - Richard son of John son of David - is the name given to a Welshman who despises his language and who imitates the English Dic Siôn Dafydd left Wales and became a draper in London. His pomposity led him to claim that he had forgotten how to speak Welsh, and on a visit to his mother in Wales who spoke only Welsh he insisted on speaking English). The poem lampoons those of the upwardly-mobile Welsh in London who turned their backs on their country and language in order to inveigle themselves to the English.
lieutenant became one of the most familiar Welsh poems of the 19th century and is still appreciated today.
The eponymous "Dic Siôn Dafydd" has entered the Welsh language as a derogatory term for any Welsh person of a similar nature, rather like "Uncle Tom" in relation to Afro-Americans.
