Identified during a programme of systematic field walking, in which archaeologists walk across open ground in methodical lines scanning for surface finds, this small scatter of worked stone pushes human presence in this corner of Cork back to the Later Mesolithic, a period roughly spanning from around 7000 to 4000 BC. These were people living before farming reached Ireland, subsisting by hunting, fishing, and foraging, and apparently doing so within sight of the sea.

The site came to attention through a personal communication from Professor Peter Woodman of University College Cork, one of Ireland's foremost authorities on the Mesolithic period. Woodman's identification of the material as Later Mesolithic is significant. Flint does not occur naturally across most of Munster in any abundance, so its presence here suggests either local sourcing from glacial deposits or the movement of material across considerable distances, both of which are consistent with what is known of Mesolithic mobility and exchange. The location in pasture overlooking the sea fits a broader pattern of Mesolithic activity along Irish coastlines, where communities would have exploited marine and estuarine resources as a central part of their way of life.