Sitting on a gentle south-westward slope in the rolling pastureland of County Westmeath, this example was recorded in 1971 as distinctly subrectangular in shape, an uncommon geometry for a monument type that typically favours the round. At around 38 metres across, it is not especially large, but its position offers good views in all directions, which tells us something about the intentions of whoever chose the site.

A ringfort, or rath, is an enclosed farmstead of the early medieval period, typically dating from roughly 500 to 1000 AD. The enclosing element is usually a raised earthen bank, sometimes accompanied by a fosse, the external ditch from which material was dug to build the bank. At Lissatunny, the bank has been worn down almost to a scarp, a barely-raised ridge flush with the surrounding ground, and no clear fosse has been identified. Two substantial gaps in the bank, one to the west and one to the south-south-east, suggest disturbance over the centuries, and the original entrance can no longer be made out with any confidence. What survives is essentially a faint geometric shadow in the pasture, legible mainly because the ground reads differently once you know what you are looking for.