What survives here is a rath, the Irish term for a ringfort, a roughly circular enclosure defined by an earthen bank and an outer ditch, or fosse. These were the farmsteads of early medieval Ireland, typically dating from roughly the fifth to the twelfth centuries, and they appear across the Irish landscape in their thousands, though many have been ploughed away or built over. This one in Parsonstown has survived, if only just.

The enclosure measures approximately 24 metres across on the northwest to southeast axis and 25 metres on the northeast to southwest, making it a modest example of its type. A low bank of earth and stone defines the perimeter, with the best-preserved stretch running along the western side, where stone facing is still visible at the east, west, and northwest. Elsewhere the bank has been worn down to a scarp, a gentle slope rather than a defined edge. Outside the bank, a shallow fosse survives most clearly from the east-southeast around to the west-northwest. There is a formal entrance on the east-southeast side, a gap roughly two metres wide with a causeway crossing the fosse, which would have been the main way in and out when the site was in use. Inside, the ground slopes noticeably from the west-southwest down toward the east-northeast, and faint traces of cultivation ridges run east to west across it, suggesting the interior was worked as agricultural land at some point after the ringfort fell out of use. A second ringfort sits approximately 125 metres to the southwest, which is a common pattern; such enclosures were often built in loose clusters reflecting adjacent family landholdings or successive generations settling nearby ground.