The earliest evidence of people inhabiting the area are the remains of an Iron Age settlement of several roundhouses grouped together in an obvious community, known as Hen Dre'r Mynydd.

The dry wall layout of the ruinous site has led archaeologists to believe that the people who lived in the area were early farmers.

Before the industrialisation of the Rhondda Valleys in the late 19th century, Blaenrhondda was an agricultural area and sparsely populated.

[2] Due to an issue with the weight the engines could pull, the rail link was never the success it was hoped to be, though it did prove popular with day-trippers from the Rhondda, visiting Swansea and the Gower.

It was given this status for its rock exposures showing sediments that formed on the flood plain of a river delta during the Carboniferous period, approximately 310 million years ago.