[8] The first reference to this species came in John Ray's 1690 Synopsis, which recorded the discovery of a rare fern near the summit of Snowdon in Wales by Edward Lhwyd.

However, the plant was first definitely identified as a separate species from specimens collected in Scotland in James Bolton's 1785 publication Filices Britannica.

The story is further confused because although Lhwyd called his find A. ilvense, and a translation of the Latin name suggests the plant we now know as W. ilvensis, examination of his specimens has shown that he collected W. alpina.

[5][9] Alpine woodsia and W. ilvensis both came under severe threat from Victorian fern collectors in the mid 19th century in Scotland, especially in the Moffat Hills.

John Sadler, later a curator of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, nearly lost his life obtaining a fern tuft on a cliff near Moffat and a botanical guide called William Williams died collecting alpine woodsia in Wales in 1861.