Not a road in any grand sense, but a togher, the Irish term for a wooden trackway laid across wetland to allow people and animals to cross ground that would otherwise swallow them. This particular example, found at Derryoghil, is a modest construction: just under a metre wide and less than a tenth of a metre deep, running east to west through the bog.

The trackway belongs to what archaeologists classify as a class 3 togher, meaning it was built from longitudinal brushwood rather than more substantial hewn planks or split timbers. The material is telling in its own quiet way. Alder, hazel, and ash are exactly the kinds of wood that would have grown along the margins of boggy ground in the Irish midlands, readily cut and laid in place by whoever needed to make the crossing. Alder in particular has a long history of use in wet conditions, since it resists decay in waterlogged environments far better than most other native timbers. The choice of these three species together suggests a practical opportunism rather than any formal engineering, someone, or a community of people, making use of what was close to hand to solve an immediate and recurring problem.