The rath, a ringfort of the kind built across Ireland from the early medieval period onwards as a defended farmstead or settlement, was used, according to local tradition, as a burial ground for children. There are no visible graves. No headstones, no markers, no mounding of the ground to indicate where anyone lies. The knowledge exists only in the memory of the community around it.

The practice of burying unbaptised children, or infants who died before formal Christian burial could be arranged, in pre-Christian or liminal spaces was once widespread across Ireland. Ringforts, ancient earthworks, and marginal ground on the edges of parishes served as quiet alternatives to consecrated churchyards, which were often closed to those who had not received the sacraments. These informal burial places, sometimes called cillíní or cillíns, occupy a complicated position in Irish religious and social history, used out of necessity and grief rather than official sanction. The Rahanane rath appears to have served this function, though the ground itself gives nothing away.