A long cist is a type of stone-lined grave, typically rectangular in form and large enough to contain an extended human body, associated with prehistoric burial practice in Ireland. This one sits on the shoulder of a hill with open views to the north and east, positioned just to the north-east of a nearby ringfort, that familiar feature of the Irish landscape, a circular earthwork enclosure generally dating to the early medieval period. The proximity of the two monuments hints at a landscape that was, across different eras, repeatedly chosen as a place of significance.

There were originally two long cist burials at this location, but on the 11th of October 1956 both were demolished, the work attributed to University College Cork. What precisely prompted their removal is not recorded here, though such demolitions were not uncommon in mid-twentieth-century Ireland, when the urgency of archaeological preservation was not always matched by the resources or the will to act on it. The loss is made more pointed by a separate discovery: around 1966, the landowner reported finding human bones in a field to the south-east, suggesting that burial activity in the area may have extended beyond the two recorded cists. Whether those bones represent a further undocumented grave or are connected to the demolished structures is unknown.