Two of these ancient enclosures occupying the same stretch of Galway landscape, close enough to be neighbours, is an arrangement that prompts obvious questions about who lived here, and whether they did so at the same time.

The monument at Knockogonnell is a circular rath, a type of enclosed settlement built predominantly during the early medieval period in Ireland, typically between the fifth and twelfth centuries. A rath consists of a raised earthen bank, or rampart, encircling a central living area, usually accompanied by an external fosse, the drainage ditch dug to provide the material for the bank itself. This one measures 45.5 metres in diameter and survives in fair condition. Its enclosing element shifts character as it runs around the site: a conventional bank and fosse define much of the circuit, but from the north around to the east the natural ground drops away as a scarp, the slope of the land itself serving as part of the boundary. A possible entrance has been identified on the eastern side. Beyond the monument proper, field banks curve around it from the south-east, through the south, and on to the north-west, suggesting that the agricultural organisation of the surrounding land has long taken the rath's presence into account, shaping itself around an obstacle that was already ancient.