On the eastern slope of Silliothill in County Kildare, a fragment of what was once a double-banked ringfort survives in rough pasture, overgrown and largely forgotten. Only the western quarter remains in any recognisable form, yet even that partial survival tells a fairly detailed story. A rath, to use the Irish term, was a circular earthwork enclosure typical of early medieval Ireland, most commonly associated with farmsteads of the period roughly between 500 and 1000 AD. What makes this example of particular interest is that it appears to have been bivallate, meaning it was defended by two concentric banks and ditches rather than the single ring more commonly encountered across the Irish countryside.

The surviving earthworks, though reduced, are still substantial in places. The inner bank stands to an external height of 3.1 metres, with a broad outer fosse, or ditch, measuring 4.7 metres wide and 2 metres deep running along the south-west to north-west arc of the site. Beyond that, a second outer bank remains visible to the west-north-west. From the north around to the north-east, the monument has been cut away and replaced by a later straight scarp, while a field bank running from the north-east to the south-west now defines what was once the interior. The two gaps visible in the remains, one to the north-east and one to the south-west, are considered modern intrusions rather than original entrances. Researchers writing in 1986 proposed a connection between this monument and the deserted medieval borough of Silliothill, the remains of which lie nearby. If that association holds, the rath may have formed part of a much longer story of settlement and abandonment on this hillside, from early medieval enclosure through to a borough that itself eventually vanished from the landscape.