Enclosures of this kind are among the most common yet least understood features of the Irish countryside. The term covers a broad range of structures, from the circular earthen ringforts that served as farmsteads during the early medieval period, to ecclesiastical enclosures marking the boundaries of an early monastery or burial ground, to simple stock enclosures whose origins are harder to pin down. What distinguishes any one of them is usually the detail, and for Robeen, that detail remains elusive.