The site commands extensive views of the Conwy Valley and coast, and was once the location of a hillfort, which was initially excavated in the autumn of 1997 for the Gwynedd Archaeological Trust. The excavations revealed a "massive, well-built" wall formed from quarried limestone, believed to have once been 3 m (9.8 ft) high and to have been fronted by 3.5 m (11 ft) of rubble. There were no archaeological discoveries permitting a certain identification, but the pre-Norman layout led David Longley, the study's director, to connect it with the early-6th century king of RhosCynlas the Red on the basis of the "Bear Den" (Latin: receptaculi ursi) mentioned in Gildas's passage on him and the surviving local name of the area as Dinerth (Old Welsh: Din Eirth, "Fort Bear").[2][3]
