Enclosures of this kind are among the most common yet least understood monument types in Ireland, appearing in their thousands across the countryside. They may be the remains of a ringfort, a roughly circular earthwork that served as a farmstead during the early medieval period, or they might belong to an entirely different tradition, prehistoric or later. Without further detail, the form itself is the only clue available, and in Clare, where the underlying karst limestone shapes both the terrain and the archaeology in unusual ways, even that form can be deceptive.