What makes this particular ringfort worth a second look is the survival of its original stone facing along the northern and north-eastern arc of the bank, a detail that hints at a more carefully constructed enclosure than the grassed-over mounds that time has reduced most ringforts to.

Ringforts, which are enclosed farmsteads typically dating from the early medieval period, roughly 500 to 1000 AD, were once the most common settlement type across Ireland. The example at Ellagh measures approximately 32 metres north to south and 31 metres east to west, making it a reasonably substantial specimen. The defining bank, still legible around most of its circuit, retains that stone facing at its north-western and north-eastern sections, suggesting it was originally revetted in stone rather than simply piled from excavated earth. A field bank running from the east, around the south, and continuing to the west encloses the monument on those sides, a feature that may reflect later agricultural organisation working around, and in deference to, the earlier structure. Several gaps in the bank appear to be modern rather than original, likely the result of agricultural access over recent centuries rather than any ancient entrance arrangement.