That it survived at all is something of an accident. The kiln only came to light in 1997 when archaeologists, excavating below the foundation layer of one of the manor's outbuildings, found themselves looking at a neatly constructed pit they had not expected to find.

A lime kiln is, in essence, a small furnace used to burn limestone at high temperature, producing quicklime that could then be slaked with water and used as mortar, plaster, or agricultural dressing. The example at Ballymount is modest in scale, measuring 1.2 metres wide and 0.71 metres deep, with a flat base of limestone slabs and vertical walls of irregularly shaped stone. What makes it archaeologically interesting is the sequence of deposits left inside after it went out of use. At the bottom sits a layer of white lime mortar no more than 0.13 metres thick, the residue of the kiln's working life. Above that lies a mixed layer of brown soil with orange clay flecks, and on top of everything a fill of boulders that appears to have been used to deliberately cap the structure. Among those fills, excavators recovered three sherds of Dublin-type ware and one sherd of Leinster cooking ware, both pottery traditions associated with the medieval period, which places the kiln's use and subsequent abandonment somewhere in the Middle Ages. The finds were recorded by Conway in 1998 and the site compiled by Geraldine Stout.

Ballymount manor sits in south County Dublin, in an area that saw significant Anglo-Norman settlement and development during the medieval period. The kiln itself is not a visible feature in any conventional sense; it lies underground, beneath what is now the footprint of a later structure. Visitors with an interest in medieval Dublin are more likely to encounter this site through published archaeological reports than in person. The 1997 excavation remains the primary source of information, and Conway's report gives the clearest account of the stratigraphy. For those researching the archaeology of the Dublin Pale or the material culture of medieval manorial estates, Ballymount is a useful case study precisely because of what was found quietly buried under an unremarkable floor.