Seen from the right angle on its west-facing slope, though, the shape resolves itself: a circular enclosure roughly 31.5 metres across, its defining bank still rising to nearly two metres on the south-east to west-south-west arc, with a lower profile where the ground levels out elsewhere.

This is a rath, the Irish term for a ringfort, the most common monument type surviving in the Irish landscape. Ringforts were typically built and occupied during the early medieval period, roughly between the fifth and twelfth centuries, and served as enclosed farmsteads for a single family or small household. The earthen bank, thrown up from an internal or external ditch, provided both a physical boundary and a degree of status. Tens of thousands once existed across Ireland; a significant number have been ploughed out or built over, which makes those that survive in pasture, like this one, relatively fortunate. The Pluckanes example is modest in scale, with none of the multiple banks that would indicate a more high-ranking enclosure, but its proportions and surviving bank height suggest it has come through the centuries with reasonable integrity.