The inner bank has a clear break on its east-south-east side, accompanied by a causeway that almost certainly marks where people once passed in and out of the enclosure. Yet the outer bank has no corresponding gap. Whoever used this place would have had to cross the wide, shallow ditch between the two banks and then climb over or through the outer ring without any formal opening to guide them. Whether that outer bank was always built that way, or whether the entrance was later blocked or simply lost, is not recorded.

The site is a rath, the Irish term for a ringfort, a form of enclosed farmstead that was built and occupied across Ireland roughly between the early medieval period and the end of the first millennium. They are numerous in the Irish landscape, but this one at Lisdrumskea has a particular curiosity in its construction. The raised circular interior measures about 28.7 metres in internal diameter, enclosed by two earthen banks with the fosse, or ditch, running between them. At some point in modern times the outer bank was modified quite substantially: it was scarped, meaning its slope was cut back to make it steeper, and then faced externally with stone. A modern trench now runs around its outside. These later interventions have altered the appearance of what was originally an earthen structure, adding a layer of more recent activity over the early medieval one.