Cut into its surface are two parallel grooves, precisely 0.55 metres apart, running the entire 1.37-metre length of the stone. Whatever purpose they served, the regularity of those lines makes clear they were deliberate. Other marks on the surface have been noted, though these may simply be the work of weather and time rather than human hands.

The oratory belongs to the ecclesiastical site known as Templemanaghan, or in Irish Teampall Mhanacháin, also called Teampall Geal, meaning the bright or white church. It sits within an associated burial ground on the hillside, with Dingle Harbour and the Milltown valley spread out below. The site was recorded and described by J. Cuppage in the 1986 Dingle Peninsula archaeological survey, a comprehensive study of the Corca Dhuibhne region, and the carved fragment was noted at that time as being in situ on the oratory floor. What the grooves represent, whether a mason's working guide, a liturgical measuring device, or something else entirely, has not been definitively established.