This penitential cairn, measuring roughly three metres in diameter and standing 0.9 metres high, consists of small to medium-sized stones partially covered with sod. It’s one of three such cairns within the graveyard; another sits immediately adjacent to the southeast, whilst a third can be found about eight metres to the north-northeast.

These stone heaps aren’t random accumulations but rather integral stations along a traditional pilgrimage route known as a ‘pattern’ or ‘turas’. The devotional circuit begins at a nearby holy well before continuing as a walking meditation through the graveyard. Pilgrims circle each cairn in a clockwise direction, adding a small stone to the pile as they go, a practice that has likely continued for centuries and accounts for the cairns’ considerable size.

The entire complex sits within the southern portion of what was once a larger ecclesiastical enclosure, suggesting this site has been sacred ground for many generations. The combination of holy well, graveyard, and penitential stations represents a type of religious landscape common throughout Ireland, where pre-Christian and Christian traditions often merged into unique forms of folk devotion that persist to this day.