Sennybridge Training Area (SENTA), located upon Mynydd Epynt, is the principal one of three military training areas in Wales. The land was requisitioned for military use in 1939 and covers approximately 31,000 acres (12,000 ha) of Ministry of Defence freehold land and 6,000 acres (2,500 ha) of forested land.

Mynydd Epynt is a desolate tract of upland plateau in central southern Wales, one of a number of extremely high and remote moorlands towards the southern edge of the Cambrian Mountains that stretch between the Brecon Beacons in the south and the peaks of Snowdonia in the north. This bare plateau is dotted with small ponds and peat bogs and is deeply dissected along its southern fringes by numerous river valleys, among them those of the Honddu, Bran and Cilieni. A great escarpment falls away along the north edge to the valley of the Irfon, and north-east to the route of the Wye.

Epynt was requisitioned in 1939 by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) for military training, and remains in use today as the Sennybridge Training Area; for a history of the range see Church (1990). The greater proportion of Mynydd Epynt, some 196 sq kms, forms a restricted military `Impact Area? used for live firing and training. To the south-west Mynydd Bwlch y Groes is a continuing ridge of high ground also used for training.

The Sennybridge ranges have long been used for artillery practice and live firing takes place for most of the year. There is some live firing by ground-attack fighter aircraft, as well as use of air-dropping zones, although infantry are now the area's predominant users, firing mortars, anti-tank weapons and machine guns. The FIBUA (Firing in Built Up Areas) training village is a key facility (NPRN 268123).

The Training Area encompasses a wide range of sites of different periods, in varying conditions, and its continued existence has preserved an historic landscape as it was pre-1939, unchanged by modern farming methods.

Several archaeological surveys have examined the history of the training area, including the Royal Commission's Brecknock Inventories, air photo mapping by the Royal Commission in 1996-7, and more recent surveys of the prehistoric ritual and settlement sites of the range, and the medieval and post-medieval deserted rural settlements, by the Clwyd Powys Archaeological Trust.

The Disgwylfa farmhouse (NPRN 242006) in the east of the training area, on the public B4519 Garth-Upper Chapel road, now serves as the Epynt Way Visitor Centre.

Incorporates Sennybridge Camp (NPRN 310059)

Comprehensive oblique aerial surveys of the Training Area were carried out by the Royal Commission during August Range closures on 8th August 2007 and 20th August 2024.

B.A.Malaws, RCAHMW, 2008. T. Driver, RCAHMW, 2014. Updated by Toby Driver, RCAHMW, September 2024

Bibliography:

AFTC SAS, 2000. AFTC Sennybridge Archaeological Survey, Archaeological Investigations Ltd: Hereford Archaeology Series 450.

Briggs, C. S. 1994. Sennybridge Training Area: A fossil agricultural landscape. Sanctuary, The Ministry of Defence Conservation Magazine, Number 23. 13-14.

Church, R., 1990. 'Sennybridge Training Area 1940-1990', Cardiff.

Davies, W.D.R, 1984. Epynt Without People...and Much More, Talybont: Y Lolfa

Driver, T.G. 1996. `Air Photo Mapping and Record Creation Programme: Results 1995-6?, Archaeology in Wales 36, 49.

Driver, T.G. 1997. Archaeological survey of: Mynydd Epynt (Sennybridge Training Area) Powys, Aberystwyth, Aberystwyth: RCAHMW; AP Mapping Report No 1.

Driver, T. and Silvester, R. 2003. Mynydd Epynt: Rediscovering and Abandoned Farming Landscape, in: Browne, D., and Hughes, S. The Archaeology of the Welsh Uplands, RCAHMW, 87-97.

Driver, T. 1997. Mynydd Epynt (Sennybridge Training Area): RCAHM (W) Air Photo Mapping and Record Creation, Brecknockshire and Carmarthenshire. Archaeology in Wales 37, 27-31.

Driver, T. and Davis, O. 2012. Historic Wales from the Air: Images from the National Monuments Record of Wales, RCAHMW.

Khan, M, 1995. `Sennybridge Training Area?, After The Battle 90, 42-49.

RCAHMW, 1986. Brecknock: The Prehistoric and Roman Monuments, Part II, Hill-forts and Roman Remains, HMSO.

RCAHMW, 1997. Brecknock: Later Prehistoric Monuments and Unenclosed Settlements to 1000AD, HMSO.

Wessex Archaeology, 2003. Crychan Forest, Sennybridge Training Area, Brecon, Archaeological monument condition survey, unpublished archive report 54011.01