These structures, known variously as raths or cashels depending on whether they were built from earth or stone, were the farmsteads of early medieval Ireland, typically dating from roughly the fifth to the twelfth century. They were domestic enclosures rather than military fortifications, their banks serving to define a household's space and keep livestock secure. Clare is particularly dense with such monuments, the limestone geology and relatively undisturbed agricultural land having preserved many that elsewhere were levelled by later farming.

The place-name itself is worth pausing on. "Caher" derives from the Irish "cathair", a word used for a stone fort or enclosure, suggesting that the wider area may have had a notable fortified site at some point, or at least that the memory of one shaped how locals named the land. Combined with "cannavan", possibly derived from a personal name or a descriptor now difficult to trace with certainty, the townland name quietly carries layers of occupation and identity that predate any written record of the site. Ringforts of this type were typically home to a single extended family of some local standing, the interior containing a house, outbuildings, and sometimes a souterrain, an underground stone-lined passage used for storage or refuge.