It is, in fact, a bullaun, a type of stone bearing one or more cup-shaped hollows that are found at early ecclesiastical sites across Ireland. Their precise function remains debated, but they are generally associated with early Christian and pre-Christian ritual practice, and the water that collects in their hollows has long been credited with curative properties.

This particular bullaun, which bears a single hollow, lay unrecognised among a loose group of stones along the graveyard boundary at Balisland until 2009, when the Yewtree Restoration Committee identified it during work at the site. The associated graveyard, recorded as WI047-002, provided the context that made sense of the find. Once identified, the stone was lifted from the scatter and placed on top of the wall next to the stile, where it is now visible to anyone entering the graveyard.

The stone is straightforward to find: it sits at the stile entrance to the graveyard. The hollow is subtle rather than dramatic, as is often the case with bullauns that have spent centuries displaced from their original setting, but the form is clear enough once you know what you are looking at.