What makes it worth attention is the unevenness of its own defences: the bank rises to a substantial 2.7 metres along the south-east to south-west arc, while elsewhere it drops to a scarp of just one metre. This asymmetry is not accidental decay but almost certainly reflects deliberate design, with the most exposed or vulnerable approach receiving the heaviest fortification.

This is a rath, the Irish term for a ringfort, the most common type of Early Medieval monument in Ireland. Ringforts were typically enclosed farmsteads, built roughly between the fifth and twelfth centuries, in which a bank and ditch protected a homestead and its livestock from both human threat and wandering animals. At Camus, the enclosed area measures approximately 33 metres north to south and 34 metres east to west, placing it within the typical size range for a single-family enclosure. The external fosse, a defensive ditch dug outside the bank, follows the same pattern of variation: it reaches a depth of one metre to the north-west but shallows to just 0.4 metres along the south-east to south-west section, where the bank itself is tallest and presumably considered sufficient. The interplay between bank height and ditch depth around the circuit suggests a considered response to the local terrain rather than a uniform defensive formula applied without thought.