What makes it quietly notable is the combination of its modest survival and its situation: an east-facing slope edging toward boggy ground, with marsh pressing in from the east. The bank, which reaches roughly 0.6 metres in height along the southern to eastern arc, encloses an oval area measuring about 31 metres north to south and 34 metres east to west. On the western side, a shallow external fosse, essentially a ditch dug to provide material for the bank and to add a further barrier, still traces its line in the ground.

This is a rath, the most common type of early medieval settlement monument in Ireland. Raths were typically the enclosed farmsteads of farming families, with the earthen bank and ditch serving as much to define a household boundary and contain livestock as to offer serious defence. Most date to the period between roughly the sixth and twelfth centuries, though many continued in use or accumulated meaning in local tradition long after. The Cloonee example sits 600 metres north of a second ringfort in the same area, a proximity that hints at a broader pattern of early settlement across this landscape between Lough Mask and Lough Carra. The site was recorded as part of an archaeological survey of the Ballinrobe district compiled by D. Lavelle for the Lough Mask and Lough Carra Tourist Development Association and published in 1994.