That layering of functions, mundane commerce on the ground floor and the full weight of the law directly above, was not unusual for Irish market-houses of the period, but the specific history of this one in O'Connell Square is unusually well documented for something that no longer exists.

Before the market-house was built, Ennis had no dedicated civic space for legal proceedings. Court sessions from 1570 onwards were conducted in the vaulted chapterhouse or sacristy of the Franciscan Friary, a practical arrangement that speaks to the town's limited infrastructure at the time. By 1641, a purpose-built market-house had been erected on the eastern side of what was then the town's main marketplace. Thomas Dineley, who sketched the building in 1681, recorded an L-shaped, gabled structure of two or three floors. By 1703, when it appeared on Moland's map, it had acquired a cupola above the roofline and an arched façade of three bays. The ground floor was arcaded, meaning it had open arched bays that sheltered market traders from the weather, while the upper floor housed the law courts and the county grand jury. A reference in the Orrery letters records that in 1666 the building was also used as a playhouse, which gives some sense of how fluidly such structures were adapted to community needs well beyond their stated purpose. The building was eventually replaced by a new structure around 1733, and that replacement was itself demolished in 1852, leaving no physical trace on the square today.