A rath is a type of ringfort, a roughly circular earthwork enclosure used during the early medieval period, typically as a defended farmstead. This one measures approximately 43 metres north to south and 38.5 metres east to west, making it a reasonably substantial example, though time has not been kind to it. The enclosing elements vary as you move around the perimeter: a bank and external fosse, essentially a ditch dug to throw up the bank material, survive from the north-east around through the south to the west-north-west, while a natural or modified scarp takes over the remaining arc from west-north-west back to the north-east.

What makes this particular site quietly interesting is the presence of a cist burial grave within the interior, catalogued separately but clearly part of the same archaeological landscape. Cist burials, in which a body is interred within a small stone-lined box set into the ground, are generally associated with the Bronze Age, which would make this feature considerably older than the rath itself. Their co-occurrence is not unusual across Ireland; ringfort builders sometimes chose elevated ground that had already carried meaning for earlier communities, whether deliberately or simply because a slight hill was a practical choice for enclosure and drainage alike. The combination here, a degraded early medieval enclosure sitting atop ground that may have been used for burial a thousand or more years before it, gives Fartamore a layered quality that its modest appearance does little to advertise.