Souterrains are dry-stone lined passages or chambers dug into the earth, associated with early medieval settlement in Ireland, and most likely used for cool storage or as a place of refuge. The existence of one here, catalogued separately from the fort itself, hints that whoever lived within these banks was putting serious effort into the management of daily life, and perhaps into survival.

The fort itself is nearly circular, measuring 56 metres north to south and 58 metres east to west, enclosed by an earthen bank that still stands 1.4 metres high. On its north-northwest side, the bank retains stone facing, suggesting the original construction was more elaborate than the grassed-over earthwork visible today. Outside the bank runs a fosse, a defensive ditch, still measurable at half a metre deep despite centuries of weathering and agricultural activity. A gap in the bank to the south-southeast, roughly 3.6 metres wide, marks what was almost certainly the original entrance. Ringforts of this type, known in Irish as raths, were the most common form of rural settlement in early medieval Ireland, typically enclosing a farmstead and its outbuildings, and this one in West Cork fits that pattern well, its carefully constructed bank and the hidden passage beneath pointing to a family of some modest means and forethought.