This is a cillín, the Irish term for an unconsecrated burial ground used for unbaptised infants and others excluded from burial in hallowed ground. Such places are scattered across the Irish countryside, often barely visible, their quietness lending them an unsettling quality that is quite different from the formality of a parish graveyard.

The site is roughly rectangular, measuring around twenty metres by eighteen, its western edge defined by a field wall, its northern boundary the lakeshore itself, and its eastern limit marked by the faint traces of an earthen bank. Twisted rowan and holly trees grow around the perimeter, species long associated in Irish folk belief with boundary places and protection against ill fortune. According to local tradition, the ground was in use for burial up to around 1935, a detail that places it well within living memory for much of the twentieth century. The practice of burying unbaptised children outside consecrated ground was common throughout Catholic Ireland until relatively recent times, shaped by theological rules that denied such infants the rites of the Church. Many cillíní occupy liminal spots like this one, at the edges of lakes, townland boundaries, or ancient earthworks, places that existed at the margins of settled, sanctioned space.