The example at Gortatlea in County Kerry is one such site, a rath, which is the Irish term for a roughly circular enclosure defined by an earthen bank and ditch, typically dating to the early medieval period between roughly the fifth and twelfth centuries. These were the farmsteads of their age, the everyday living spaces of farming families rather than the grand defensive structures their name might imply.

Gortatlea itself is a townland in the northern part of Kerry, lying in the broad agricultural lowlands between Tralee and Castleisland. The landscape here is quietly layered, the kind of place where early medieval settlement patterns left their mark on the ground and have never been entirely erased. Raths in this region tend to sit on gently rising ground, chosen for drainage and visibility, and were the centres of small family farms whose inhabitants worked the surrounding land, kept cattle, and lived within the protection of the enclosing bank. The bank and internal hollow of a rath were often accompanied by a fosse, the external ditch from which the bank material was originally dug, and sometimes by an outer bank as well, the number of enclosing elements broadly reflecting the status of the occupying household.