This site carries three concentric earthen banks, each separated by a fosse (a defensive ditch), giving it a degree of fortification that suggests either an occupant of considerable local standing or a location that warranted serious protection. The innermost bank still rises to 1.75 metres, the middle bank to 2 metres externally, and even the outermost fosse survives to a depth of a metre along its visible arc. That arc runs from the south-south-west around to the north-north-west, which is where the archaeology ends: a field fence has cut across the northern side, and ploughing has levelled the eastern and southern portions almost entirely.

Ringforts, also called raths or lios depending on region and local tradition, were the typical enclosed farmsteads of early medieval Ireland, in use roughly from the fifth to the twelfth centuries. A triple-banked example would have belonged to someone of high social rank. The Tinageragh site sits on a north-facing slope with open views to the north and east, its roughly circular interior measuring about 33 metres north to south and 31 metres east to west, sloping gently toward the north-east. Just to the east-south-east, there is a possible souterrain, an underground stone-lined passage that typically served for storage or refuge. The connection between the two features is plausible, and a note published by Power in 1916 records a lios in this townland with associated souterrains, a reference that most likely describes this same site. That a local scholar was documenting it over a century ago gives some sense of how long this earthwork has caught the attention of those who knew where to look.