Academic and Political Career
Griffiths took up a teaching post (Latin) at Bala Grammar School in 1934, and then teaching at his old school in Porth in 1939. He was a conscientious objector during the Second World War. In 1946 he was appointed lecturer in Classics at University College, Swansea. From 1957 to 1958 he was a Lady Wallis Budge Research Lecturer at University College, Oxford, and in 1959 he was promoted to a senior lecturship at Swansea, becoming reader in Classics in 1965. In 1973 he was awarded a personal Chair in Classics and Egyptology at Swansea.
In 1946 he and his wife moved to the Uplands, Swansea, and in 1957 to Sketty in Swansea. In 1946 he began editing the Welsh Magazine, Y Fflam (The Flame) with Euros Bowen, mainly as a response to W.J. Gruffydd's Y Llenor, a Professor of Welsh at Cardiff, whom the Cadwgan Circle saw as the antiquated voice of Welsh language politics.
During this period Griffiths became more and more associated with the national party for Wales, Plaid Genedlaethol Cymru and from 1948 until 1952 edited the party's newspaper Y Ddraig Goch. Griffiths also stood as a Plaid Cymru candidate in the 1959 and 1964 general elections, on both occasions for the Gower constituency, but was not elected. Griffiths was also an important figure in the promotion of Welsh language in education and law, and on several occasions was arrested in nonviolent protests.
He lectured at a wide array of universities, including Cairo (1965-66 as visiting professor), Tübingen, Bonn and All Souls College, Oxford (as visiting fellow). Griffiths wrote several major works on Egyptian religion, as well as work on Latin and Greek texts. However, he is better known in Wales for his poetry, of which he published four collections of texts, all in the Welsh language. He also wrote literary criticism, most notably I Ganol y Frwydr (Into the Thick of Battle) in 1970.
He retired in 1979, but continued writing on classical and egyptological themes. Among his output are two of his most important academic texts, his editions of Plutarch's De Iside et Osiride (1970) and Apuleius of Madaura The Isis Book (1975), from the last book of the Golden Ass. He edited the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology between 1970 and 1978.
His later substantial books include The Origins of Osiris and his Cult (1980), Atlantis and Egypt (1991), The Divine Verdict (1991), and Triads and Trinity (1996) as well as contributing to The Cambridge History of Judaism (1999). He obtained D.Litt (Oxford) and D.D. (Wales) degrees for his contributions to the study of the ancient world.
Griffiths had two sons with Bosse, Robat Gruffudd (b. 1943) and Heini Gruffudd (b. 1946).
Read more about this topic: J. Gwyn Griffiths
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