They were essentially defended homesteads, built out into a lake to take advantage of the water as a natural barrier, and they could be surprisingly sophisticated, with wooden palisades, thatched buildings, and causeways or small boats providing access to the shore.

Lough Gill is perhaps best known through the poetry of W. B. Yeats, whose "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" drew on the small wooded island visible from the southern shore. But the lake holds older and quieter presences than that. A crannog recorded here points to a much earlier period of settlement, when the lough's waters offered security rather than merely scenery. The specific details of this site, its date of construction, the evidence recovered from or around it, and its relationship to the surrounding landscape, remain to be more fully documented in the public record.