Measuring roughly 7.25 metres north to south and 5.7 metres east to west, it is defined by nothing more than a low bank of loose rubble, with no surviving wall-facing and no discernible entrance. It is the kind of structure that resists easy interpretation, which is, in its own quiet way, part of what makes it interesting.

A cashel is a stone-walled enclosure, typically of early medieval date in an Irish context, built to define and protect a farmstead or settlement. This particular house sits within the western sector of one such enclosure at Barnaderg. Whether the building was constructed as an integral part of the cashel, bonded into its wall, or simply added later and pressed up against it, cannot be determined. The collapse of the surrounding stonework has obscured that relationship entirely. The D-shape itself may reflect that the straight side of the structure once ran along, or near, the interior face of the cashel wall, a practical arrangement seen elsewhere in enclosed settlements, but here the evidence no longer survives to confirm it. The date of the house remains unresolved.