The ringfort that once occupied the crest of a ridge here has been entirely levelled, leaving nothing visible above the grass of the surrounding pasture. It is the kind of absence that rewards a second look, because that slight arc in the northern boundary of the field is not accidental. It traces the ghost of a circular earthwork that, when it stood, would have enclosed a family's home, livestock, and daily life behind a raised bank and ditch.

Ringforts, known in Irish as raths, were the most common form of rural settlement in early medieval Ireland, typically built and occupied between roughly the fifth and twelfth centuries. They consisted of a circular enclosure defined by one or more earthen banks, and they ranged in size from modest family homesteads to larger enclosures suggesting higher-status occupants. The Rathcobane example was recorded on the Ordnance Survey six-inch map of 1842 as a circular enclosure measuring approximately twenty-five metres across on a northwest to southeast axis, sitting on the ridge crest in a commanding position over the surrounding land. The place name itself preserves the memory of the site, since "rath" in Irish townland names almost always signals a former ringfort in the vicinity, whether or not the physical remains have survived.