This is a rath, the common Irish term for a ringfort, a type of enclosed farmstead that was the standard unit of rural settlement in early medieval Ireland, broadly from around the fifth to the twelfth centuries. Thousands survive across the country in varying states of preservation, but this one at Curheen is on the poorer end of the spectrum, its features worn and partial, which gives it a particular kind of interest.

The site measures roughly fifty metres on a north-south axis and forty-five metres east to west, making it a modestly sized example of the form. It is defined by a bank and fosse, the fosse being a surrounding ditch typically dug to provide material for the bank, and the combination of the two would originally have formed a reasonably substantial enclosure boundary. A section of what may be a second, outer bank survives at the north-north-west, hinting at a more elaborate original layout, though the evidence is only partial. A causewayed entrance gap at the north-north-east marks the original point of access, a causeway being a deliberate uncut section left across the fosse to allow entry. The fosse itself remains visible along the southern, western, and north-north-western arc of the monument, while a field wall, presumably of much later date, runs along the southern and south-western edge, the kind of quiet layering of different periods that is common in Irish farmland.