A megalithic tomb of this kind, built during the Neolithic period somewhere between roughly 4000 and 2000 BC, represents one of the earliest forms of monumental construction in Ireland, typically consisting of large upright stones supporting a capstone, the whole structure once covered by a cairn of smaller stones or an earthen mound.

The principal scholarly record for this site comes from Seán Ó Nualláin's Survey of the Megalithic Tombs of Ireland, Volume V, covering County Sligo, published by the Stationery Office in Dublin in 1989. Ó Nualláin's survey was a landmark piece of fieldwork, systematically cataloguing the spread of megalithic monuments across the county, a county which includes the celebrated Carrowmore complex and the great passage tomb of Knocknarea, but also dozens of less prominent sites that survive in various states of completeness. Clooneen is among those quieter entries in that record.