Passage tombs are among the most architecturally deliberate of Ireland's prehistoric monuments: a burial chamber reached by a stone-lined corridor, the whole structure typically covered by a cairn of loose stone or earth. That someone chose to build one here, on this particular stretch of bare karst, is a fact that tends to outlast most of the explanations offered for it.

The Burren has one of the highest concentrations of megalithic monuments in Ireland, a consequence partly of geography and partly of preservation. The thin soils and exposed limestone that make the region so visually distinctive also discouraged the intensive cultivation that destroyed so many comparable sites elsewhere. Parknabinnia sits within this broader prehistoric landscape, which includes wedge tombs, ringforts, and field systems of various periods, some of the stone boundaries still visible on the surface dating back thousands of years. Passage tombs as a class are generally associated with the Neolithic period, roughly four to six thousand years ago, and were often used for communal burial over long spans of time rather than as single interments.