It is precisely this geography that made such places attractive to the people who built promontory forts, a form of coastal enclosure in which natural cliffs did most of the defensive work and a constructed bank or wall across the landward approach completed the circuit. The result was a defensible space requiring far less labour than an inland ringfort, and the Mayo coastline preserves several examples in varying states of survival.

Tearmann Caithreach is a place-name worth pausing on. "Tearmann" in Irish generally indicates a sanctuary or church land, territory that once enjoyed some form of ecclesiastical protection or association. "Caithreach" can relate to a city or a fortified place, though place-name meanings shift considerably over centuries and local usage adds its own layers. Whether the name reflects a memory of the fort itself, a later religious connection to the headland, or something else entirely is not certain, but the combination hints at a site that accumulated significance across different periods. Coastal promontory forts in Ireland are broadly associated with the Iron Age, though some were reused or modified in early medieval times, and the line between a defensive enclosure and a monastic or secular boundary can be difficult to draw at this distance.