These enclosures, known variously as raths or ringforts depending on their construction, were the most common form of rural settlement in early medieval Ireland, built roughly between the fifth and twelfth centuries. A rath typically consisted of one or more concentric banks of earth and ditches enclosing a farmstead, offering a degree of protection for a farming family and their livestock. Tens of thousands once existed across the island; a significant number survive, though many have been ploughed out or built over in the centuries since.

Clonmoher is a small townland in Clare, a county with a particularly dense concentration of early medieval remains, shaped in part by its geology and the relative stability of its land use over long periods. The Burren to the north preserves ringforts in remarkable condition, their stone walls still intact, but earthen examples like the one at Clonmoher are found across the broader county, embedded in farmland and rough pasture alike. Without more detailed field records, the specific history of this particular enclosure, its size, the number of its banks, any souterrains or underground passages that might lie beneath it, remains difficult to establish with precision.