The one at Drumquin in County Clare is a rath, the term used for an earthen ringfort, typically consisting of a roughly circular area enclosed by one or more raised banks and ditches. These structures date primarily from the early medieval period, roughly the fifth to the twelfth centuries, and functioned as farmsteads and family enclosures rather than the fortifications their name implies. They were the ordinary homes of ordinary people, which is perhaps why so many have been quietly absorbed into field boundaries and forgotten.