Yet the outline of something deliberate remains, and the dimensions recorded before the worst of the decay, over ten metres long and more than eight metres wide, suggest this was no modest structure.

The building was a clochan, a type of dry-stone corbelled structure associated with early Christian monastic life in Ireland, typically oval or D-shaped in plan and built without mortar, the stones carefully angled so that each course throws rainwater outward. This example, documented by Tim Robinson in 1980, follows the D-shaped plan, and traces of its original foundations are still legible at the eastern side. What complicates the picture slightly is the presence of a narrow, L-shaped lintelled passage running along the northern and western sides of the ruin. This is not part of the original structure; it was inserted later as a sheep shelter, a practical reuse of standing ancient stonework that was common across the Aran Islands, where good building material was always scarce and always valued. The two phases of use now sit together in the one pile, early medieval devotion and post-medieval farming folded into the same cairn.

The foundations visible at the eastern edge reward a careful look. The distinction between the later L-shaped passage, with its lintelled roof stones, and the older, lower courses of the clochan itself is clearest there, where the original builders' work has not been as thoroughly disturbed. The surrounding limestone pavement is characteristic of this part of Inis Mór, flat and almost treeless, which gives the site a particular exposure and makes the remains easier to read in low, raking light.