Ringforts, known in Irish as raths or lios, were the most common form of rural settlement in early medieval Ireland, typically consisting of a circular area enclosed by one or more earthen banks and ditches. They served as farmsteads for farming families of varying social rank, and tens of thousands of them are scattered across the country, each one a faint outline of a life lived somewhere between the fifth and twelfth centuries. The one at Barravally is among the quieter examples, not widely documented in accessible sources, and easy to pass without a second glance.