It is best known as the site of a medieval friary, but recorded alongside that more prominent monument is a classified enclosure, one of thousands of such features scattered across the Irish landscape that rarely attract much attention. Enclosures, in the archaeological sense, are defined areas bounded by earthworks, stone walls, or ditches, and they appear across a vast span of Irish prehistory and early history, serving purposes that range from settlement and agriculture to ritual or defensive use. The presence of one at Strade places the townland within a pattern of long, layered human activity in this part of Mayo.

Strade itself sits in the valley of the River Moy, a landscape that has drawn people for millennia. The friary there was founded in the thirteenth century, originally for the Franciscans and later transferred to the Dominicans, and it remains one of the more significant ecclesiastical sites in Connacht. The enclosure, classified separately as a monument in its own right, likely predates or runs parallel to that medieval history, though without more detailed survey data it is difficult to place it precisely within the long sequence of occupation in the area. Mayo as a county is particularly rich in earthwork remains, many of them still incompletely documented, and Strade's enclosure is, for now, one of the quieter entries in that long inventory.