The cross it once held is long gone. What remains is the base, a quiet negative space in the stone where something sacred used to stand.

The base was catalogued by Patrick Healy in his 1972 survey of ancient monuments at Glendalough, where it appears as No. 189, noted as lying west of the structure known as the Cathedral. Healy recorded its dimensions precisely: 0.98 metres by 0.95 metres, and just 0.1 metres high. The mortise cut into its upper face measures 0.36 metres in length and 0.11 metres in width, tapering towards each end, shaped to grip the tenon of a standing cross. Mica schist is a locally available metamorphic rock, flecked and slightly lustrous, and its use here connects the piece to the wider Wicklow landscape rather than to imported or prestige materials. The exact date of the base is not recorded, but cross bases of this type are associated with early medieval monastic sites, and Glendalough, founded according to tradition by St Kevin in the sixth century, had centuries of use as an ecclesiastical centre.

The base sits in an area of the monastic enclosure that rewards slow walking. Its precise location, 12.60 metres north-west of the north-west corner of the Priest's House, is specific enough that a patient visitor with a rough sense of the site's layout should be able to find it, though it demands that you look down rather than up.