The southern side of the enclosure drops away sharply toward a narrow east-west stream below, so that the builders needed only to scarp, that is to cut back and steepen, the natural slope rather than raise a full bank. A ringfort, or rath, is an enclosed farmstead of the early medieval period, typically defined by one or more circular earthen banks and ditches; here, the southern perimeter relies almost entirely on the scarped hillside, while an earthen bank takes over to define the northern half, and a fosse, an accompanying ditch, survives to the west and north. The result is a monument that reads differently depending on which side you approach it from.

When surveyors examined the site in 1987 as part of the Castleisland District Archaeological Survey, they found the entire monument, interior included, heavily overgrown, which made close inspection difficult. Despite that, the remains of a stone-walled circular hut site were still visible towards the centre of the interior, a rare survival that hints at the domestic life once conducted within the enclosure. The only identifiable entrance is a gap in the scarp on the southern side, measuring 2.5 metres wide, which would have offered a controlled point of access from the direction of the stream below. The steep interior fall to the south, even within the enclosed space, gives the site an unusually dramatic internal topography for what is ostensibly a domestic settlement.