What remains today is subtle; a slight rise in the ground on the north side hints at where a defensive bank once stood, whilst a deep drainage ditch cut along the southern field boundary follows the line of the original moat. According to local residents, this ancient earthwork was deliberately levelled during the 1980s, erasing centuries of history in the name of agricultural improvement.

Historical maps tell a clearer story of what once existed here. The first Ordnance Survey map from 1840 shows a substantial sub-rectangular enclosure, measuring approximately 60 metres north to south and 86 metres east to west, completely surrounded by a protective bank. When OS surveyors returned to document the site in the 1950s, they found it still largely intact, sketching detailed plans and cross-sections that captured its defensive features. The southern bank appears to have been particularly significant, with later field boundaries being laid directly along its outer edge, suggesting that even as farming practices evolved, the monument’s footprint continued to influence the landscape.

Sites like this one were typically constructed during the Anglo-Norman period, serving as fortified farmsteads for colonising families who needed protection whilst establishing agricultural estates in newly conquered territories. The moat would have been filled with water, creating a defensive barrier around a central platform where a timber or stone house would have stood. Though this particular example has been largely destroyed, its documentation in historical records and the persistence of its outline in the modern landscape serve as reminders of Tipperary’s complex medieval past, when such fortifications dotted the countryside as symbols of both agricultural ambition and political uncertainty.