What makes this particular arrangement quietly puzzling is not just its age but its condition: the row is a mixture of the standing, the fallen, and the fractured, and one of its largest stones, measuring over three and a half metres long, lies flat on the ground and appears to overlie yet another stone beneath it, possibly a fragment it split from at some point in the distant past. The row runs on a NE-SW alignment, a common orientation for these Bronze Age monuments in Munster, with the smallest stone at the north-eastern end and the stones generally increasing in size toward the south-west.

Stone rows, which are found in considerable numbers across Cork and Kerry, are thought to date from the Bronze Age, though their precise function remains a matter of debate among archaeologists. Theories range from astronomical alignment markers to processional approaches to burial sites. At Gortacloghane, the south-western end of the row is where things get particularly interesting: a heavily recumbent stone rests on a small prostrate slab that forms part of an adjoining circular enclosure, and researchers have suggested this stone may originally have stood upright at that terminal end of the row. Immediately to the south-east of the row sits a kerbed enclosure about 5.5 metres in diameter, labelled as a stone circle on Ordnance Survey maps, though only its northern half survives in reasonable condition. The preserved section consists of upright slabs set edge-to-edge, with a separate slab standing just over a metre outside the enclosure to the east. A single standing stone lies roughly 120 metres to the north-east, adding to the sense that this was once a more elaborate complex of related monuments.

The site sits above a river confluence and commands open views to the south, which may itself have been significant to whoever chose this spot. The landscape here is the Iveragh Peninsula, better known for the Ring of Kerry's coastal roads than for its interior uplands, and the concentration of prehistoric monuments on these slopes rewards anyone willing to leave the tarmac behind.