First documented on the 1906 Ordnance Survey six-inch map, this square enclosure measures approximately 40 metres across and represents a type of fortified settlement that once dotted the Irish landscape during the Anglo-Norman period. Today, what remains is subtle yet telling; a slightly raised platform surrounded by the traces of an ancient fosse, or defensive ditch, that’s still visible along the northern, northeastern, and western sides, spanning roughly six metres in width.

These moated sites, which proliferated across Ireland between the 13th and 14th centuries, served as fortified farmsteads for Anglo-Norman settlers and wealthy Irish families. The water-filled ditch, or moat, that gave these structures their name provided both defence and drainage, whilst the raised platform within would have supported timber buildings, perhaps a hall house and associated farm structures. The Farnans example follows the typical pattern of these settlements, though time and agriculture have erased most of its above-ground features, leaving only the earthwork impressions to mark where medieval life once thrived.

Archaeological surveys conducted for the Archaeological Inventory of County Laois in 1995 confirmed the site’s significance, though much of what we know comes from interpreting these faint landscape features rather than excavation. The survival of even partial earthworks like these is increasingly rare in Ireland, where centuries of farming have levelled many similar sites. At Farnans, visitors won’t find dramatic ruins or towering walls, but rather the subtle undulations in the ground that speak to a time when the Irish midlands were a frontier landscape, where security and agriculture went hand in hand.