This roughly square enclosure, measuring approximately 37 metres north to south and 35 metres east to west, represents what archaeologists believe may be a moated site; a type of fortified settlement that was particularly popular during the Anglo-Norman period in Ireland.

The site’s defences consist of an earth and stone bank, still standing at about 0.6 metres high and 2.5 metres wide, which would have formed the primary barrier against intruders. Outside this bank runs a fosse, essentially a defensive ditch, measuring 1.5 metres wide and half a metre deep. Though these dimensions might seem modest today, when originally constructed these features would have been considerably more imposing, with the bank likely topped by a wooden palisade and the ditch potentially filled with water, creating the moat that gives this site type its name.

A single entrance gap, 2.5 metres wide, breaks the enclosure at the southeast corner, marking where residents and visitors would have entered this fortified space. Such moated sites were typically home to Anglo-Norman colonists or Gaelicised families of the later medieval period, serving as both farmsteads and symbols of authority in the landscape. The elevated position of this particular example would have provided excellent views across the surrounding countryside, allowing its inhabitants to monitor their lands whilst benefiting from the natural defensive advantages of the mountainous terrain.