[1][2][3] Born into a working class family in Rudry, Caerphilly, Price underwent medical training in London before returning to Wales, becoming interested in the Chartists' ideas regarding democracy and civil and political rights for all men.

Following the failed Chartist Newport Rising in 1839, he escaped prosecution by fleeing to France, where he became convinced that an ancient prophecy predicted that he would achieve Welsh independence from the United Kingdom.

Returning to Wales, Price tried reviving what he believed to be the religion of the ancient druids, Celtic ritualists active during the Iron Age.

Known for adhering to beliefs such as supporting equal rights for all men, vegetarianism, vaccine hesitancy and cremation, and opposition to vivisection and marriage, some of which were highly controversial at the time, he has been widely known as an "eccentric" and a "radical".

[5] William Price was born in a cottage at the farm Ty'n-y-coedcae ('the smallholding of the hedged field', tyddyn + y + coetgae) near Rudry near Caerphilly in Glamorganshire on 4 March 1800.

It is believed that he was a descendent of Ellis Price, the grandchild of Rhys Fawr ap Maredudd, a Welsh nobleman chiefly known for his valour at the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485, where he fought on the side of Henry VII.

His actions led to him becoming a threat to the local community; in one instance he fired a gun at a woman whom he claimed was taking sticks from his hedgerow, and in another hurled a sharp implement at another man.

Taking up lodgings near to St Paul's Cathedral, he entered The London Hospital in Whitechapel for a year of instruction under Sir William Blizard.

[15] Gaining employment caring for wealthy clients to help financially support his studies, Price eventually became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, being awarded with a certificate signed by Blizard, Abernathy and others.

Contemplating travelling to India following the culmination of his studies in London, he instead decided to return to Wales, where he worked as a general practitioner.

Price filled his farm with goats and cattle which ate and inflicted considerable damage to green trees around the property and throughout the neighbourhood, which prompted his landlord to serve him an eviction notice, which William dismissed.

On the basis of it, he was invited to take up the job of judging the eisteddfod's bardic competition, with the prize being awarded to Taliesin Williams, son of famous druid and Welsh nationalist Iolo Morganwg.

[22] In 1838 he also called for the Society to raise funds to build a Druidical Museum in the town, the receipts from which would be used to run a free school for the poor.

Many of the Chartists in the industrial areas of southern Wales took up arms in order to ready themselves for revolution against the government, and Price aided them in gaining such weaponry.

That same year, the Newport Rising took place, when many of the Chartists and their working class supporters rose up against the authorities, only to be quashed by soldiers, who killed a number of the revolutionaries.

Nonetheless, he also realised that the government would begin a crackdown of those involved in the Chartist movement in retaliation for the uprising, and so he fled to France, disguised as a woman, there he became fluent in French.

Declaring that marriage was wrong as it enslaved women, he began having a relationship with a woman named Ann Morgan, whom he moved in with, and in 1842 they had a daughter.

[26] He began developing an appearance that was unconventional at the time, for instance wearing a fox fur hat (signifying his healing powers as a doctor) and emerald green clothing, as well as growing his beard long and not cutting his hair.

"[28] In 1866, Price returned to Wales, finding that his daughter had grown up to live her own life following her mother, Ann Morgan's, death.

Price proclaimed himself a 'High priest of the sun grown old' and via a 'druidic prophecy' and feeling dissatisfied that he had not produced a son that would succeed him, he sought out a virgin to copulate with; Gwenllian (or shortened to 'Gwen'), who was 18 at the time, was chosen as his new partner.

In the evening of the following day, wearing white robes, he carried his son in his arms up towards the summit, placed his body down on the heap with his head facing the West, Price chanted 'a strange requiem' and then proceeded the funeral by setting the pile on fire.

A number of local people who were on their way back home from church noticed the fire who then congregated around it, it was said that it was a moving sight, however upon discovering that Price was attempting to burn his infant son, Sergeant Tamblyn and his officers rushed through the crowd, snatched the baby from the fire, kicked the pile in the effort of extinguishing it and promptly arrested him for what they believed was the illegal disposal of a corpse.

[36] The media interest in the court case had made Price famous, and he soon began to capitalise on this fame, selling three hundred medals, each depicting the cosmic egg and the snake that laid it, commemorating his victory, which sold at threepence each.

He began to be invited to give lectures and attend public functions, but these did not prove to be particular successes, with much of his audiences not understanding either his philosophies, or his attire, which was made out of red cloth and embroidered with green letters.

Meanwhile, in 1892 he erected a pole which was over 60 feet high, with a crescent moon symbol at its peak, on top of Caerlan hill where his first son had been cremated, and noted that he wanted his funeral to take place there as well.

It was watched by 20,000 people, and overseen by his family, who were dressed in a mix of traditional Welsh and his own Druidic clothing, it was noted, as accordance to his will and testament, that; 'no attempt shall be made to preserve the ashes of the body, but that they shall be "spread all over the earth to help the grass and flower to grow"'.

[39] His wife remarried, this time to a road inspector employed by the local council, and she gave up her Druidic beliefs to join a conventional Christian denomination, having her two children baptised into it, and Iesu Grist was renamed Nicholas, never fulfilling the ambitious predictions that his father had made about him.

[44] He opposed vaccination, in part due to his brother's childhood death following an inoculation,[43] and refused to treat patients who were tobacco smokers.

"[48] The historian Ronald Hutton later described him as "both one of the most colourful characters in Welsh history, and one of the most remarkable in Victorian Britain"[2] while his biographer Dean Powell considered him "the most notable individual in 19th century Wales".

As journalist Will Humphries reported for The Sunday Times: "... when a Hollywood actor tries to do so in a Welsh accent inspired by a nudist Victorian druid, perhaps it's best that he doesn't speak at all.