IN ANCIENT TIMES
Traces of many of their houses, in groups of three, have been discovered on the heights of Gelligaer and Brithdir, this grouping indicating that our people, like those who had gone before them, lived in hamlets up on the moorlands, and discoveries on these sites show a long continuity of occupation from Prehistoric times until well into the Middle Ages.
Long Houses.
During 1938, Lady Eileen Fox, M.A. excavated a previous, much older, settlement which is located on the eastern side of the common in an area known as Graig Spyddyd above the location of the old Ogilvie Colliery.
At 1300 feet above sea level, and just above the tree line, the settlement consisted of five or six homesteads irregularly spread over about one third of a mile and these in each case, stood upon a series of characteristic rectangular platforms that had been carved out of the mountainside.
Understood to be of the 13th century, the "platform houses", built into the hillside, were roughly constructed of stones and turf and were permanent settlements as opposed to temporary "hafods" which were for summer use only. Nearby excavations provided evidence of primitive iron smelting being undertaken on the hill by the settlers, probably using small bowl furnaces cut into hollows in the ground and called "bloomeries".
These houses were 61 feet long by 20, and 54 by 18, etc., and were built lengthways into the hillside ; thus part of the floor level was the result of excavation and partly closed by the hillside itself; part was on natural, and the remainder on " made ground ", the walls were made of stone slabs or slab and turf, and were on average a little over 3 feet thick, while the mainstay of the roof was a ridge pole, supported by two posts, itself sustaining some sort of thatch covering.
The fireplace was in the middle of the house, and the smoke escaped, if at all, through an opening in the roof. A drainage ditch existed to dispose of internal seepage from the hillside itself and this was also apparently used as a repository for household refuse and sewage; the lower end was paved and much cleaner, thus the house seems to have been divided into a " clean " and a " dirty " end. We need not be surprised at the conclusion that "this house was a primitive structure in many respects ".
Clear evidence was found of occupation in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, such as “many small fragments of this well-fixed unglazed sandy ware" and a pitcher from Caerphilly.
There were also evidences of iron working, and a stone mould was found for casting some fine metal object, such as a pendant. Signs of arable cultivation at the nearby Dinas Noddfa site were found, but it is unknown for certain whether it was undertaken here. Certainly the settlement was pastoral.
Lady Eileen Fox, who conducted the excavations, observes " a terminal date for the occupation in the first half of the fourteenth century seems likely ". There were several reasons why this region was hard hit at this time. Under the impact of spreading English influence, and oppressive administration, the old Welsh way of life may have been shaken.