The result is a cliff-edge fort, a type of enclosure that uses a natural drop as its primary defence on one or more sides, supplementing it with earthworks only where the landscape offers no such shortcut. Here at Maulagowna, a pointed promontory juts out to the north-west, its western and northern flanks falling away steeply to the valley below. The views across to Lough Inchiquin are considerable, which was almost certainly part of the point.

The man-made element of the enclosure is an arc of earthen bank running roughly north-east to south-west across the landward side of the promontory, sealing off the one approach that the cliff could not handle. That bank is substantial: about six metres wide and standing over two metres tall on its interior face, where it is reinforced with a drystone revetment, a facing of dry-laid stone used to stabilise an earthen structure and prevent slippage. On the outer side, a fosse, or defensive ditch, runs parallel to the bank, adding another layer of difficulty for anyone approaching from the south-east. A causewayed entrance, essentially a raised walkway across the fosse, provides a narrow gap of about one and a half metres at the south. Inside, the ground slopes down toward the north-west, and small boulders break the surface throughout. About twenty-five metres to the south-east, a relict field boundary survives, a trace of a much later agricultural landscape that grew up around and presumably after whatever activity the fort once enclosed.

The site sits on a north-west-facing slope above a tributary of the Glaninchiquin River in south-west Kerry. The rough pasture setting and the absence of any clear path mean the approach requires some care, particularly given how close the interior ground comes to the cliff edge on the western and northern sides. The interior boulders and the remains of the drystone revetment are visible on the inner face of the bank, and the fosse on the south-eastern side remains well-defined.