A rath, as ringforts of this earthen type are sometimes called, was typically built to assert presence and offer a degree of protection, yet this one sits in marshy ground, the kind of terrain that would have made approach difficult and daily life decidedly damp. What it lacks in dry footing it compensates for with outlook: the bank commands a clear view to the south, suggesting that whoever chose this spot knew exactly what they were doing, wetland and all.

The enclosure itself is circular, roughly 24.7 metres in diameter, defined by an earthen bank rising to about 1.5 metres. These dimensions are fairly typical of an early medieval rath, the sort of enclosed farmstead that housed a family of some local standing in Ireland between roughly the fifth and twelfth centuries. What makes the Knockshanawee example particularly interesting is its immediate landscape. A well sits approximately ten metres to the north, with a stream running south-east from it, suggesting the site was chosen in part for reliable water access despite, or perhaps because of, the marshy conditions. About forty metres further north in the same field lies a fulacht fiadh, a type of ancient cooking site identified by the characteristic mound of fire-cracked stone left behind after repeated use of water-filled troughs heated with hot rocks. The presence of both a rath and a fulacht fiadh in the same field points to sustained human activity in this corner of mid Cork across a considerable stretch of time, the fulacht fiadh tradition generally predating the ringfort period by many centuries.