These are clochans, the dry-stone beehive cells associated with early medieval monastic and domestic life in Ireland, though here both have long since fallen. What survives is the outline: low, rounded humps of stone that still hold the logic of their original form, even in ruin.

The larger of the two measures 7.5 metres by 5.3 metres, with internal wall facing still visible at its north-east side, suggesting it was a substantial structure. The smaller, about 15 metres to the east, is more modest at 2.8 metres by 2.3 metres, but retains something the larger does not: traces of opposing doorways on its east and west sides, hinting at a deliberate alignment or perhaps a through-passage. Both cairns are oval in plan, which is typical of the clochan form, where corbelled stone walls, built without mortar and leaning gradually inward, were raised to create a self-supporting domed roof. The pair lie roughly 90 metres east of Dún Eochla, one of the ancient stone forts of Inis Mór, placing them in a landscape already dense with early human activity.