Templemochulla, as the name is rendered, follows a familiar pattern in Irish ecclesiastical placenames: the prefix "temple" derives from the Irish "teampall", meaning church, while the "Mo" element is an affectionate diminutive attached to a saint's name, a convention common in early medieval Irish Christianity. The full name likely honours a local or regional saint called Chulla, though beyond the name itself, the historical figure has left almost no trace in surviving hagiography or annals.

Ruined churches of this kind are scattered across the Clare landscape, many of them marking sites of early Christian activity that predate the formal organisation of the medieval parish system. They were often simple single-chamber structures, built first in timber and later in mortared stone, serving small rural communities whose boundaries were defined more by kinship and land-holding than by any administrative line. In many cases, a graveyard continued in use long after the church fabric had fallen, meaning these ruins frequently sit within burial grounds that remained active for centuries after the building itself was abandoned. Whether that is true here at Garraun is not currently documented in any accessible published source, but the pattern is common enough across the region to be worth bearing in mind when approaching such a site.