The one in question is a ditch barrow, a type of funerary monument in which a circular area of ground is defined not by a raised mound but by a surrounding fosse, that is, a shallow ditch cut into the earth, leaving the enclosed interior relatively elevated. Here the fosse is roughly a metre wide and only eight to ten centimetres deep, and the interior itself is modest, measuring approximately 2.5 metres north to south and 2.3 metres east to west. It is a small, quiet thing.

What gives this particular barrow a degree of quiet interest is the care apparently taken in its construction. The ground slopes gently downward to the west, and the perimeter of the interior is built up slightly on the south-western to north-western arc, suggesting that whoever laid out the monument was compensating for the natural fall of the land, keeping the enclosed space as level as possible. Two companion barrows lie very close by, one abutting to within about two metres to the south-east, another sitting roughly seven metres to the west, and all three occupy an elevated area once defined by old water channels, now largely absorbed into the surrounding farmland. Ditch barrows of this kind are generally associated with the Bronze Age or early Iron Age in Ireland, though the specific date of the Ballynahow examples is not recorded.