It is easy to overlook, partly because it is awkward to examine fully given its position, and partly because nobody is entirely sure what it was for. That uncertainty is precisely what makes it interesting.

The stone was recorded in 2010 by Laurence Dunne during a graveyard survey of the medieval burial ground at Garfinny. It measures roughly 0.56 by 0.65 metres and is only about 16 centimetres thick, flat-topped and blocky rather than tall and pillar-like. The perforation is hour-glass shaped, placed centrally near the top of the stone, narrowing from about 10 centimetres at the outer face to 8.5 centimetres at its tightest point. Holed or perforated stones are generally associated with early ecclesiastical sites across Ireland, though they remain poorly understood. The more familiar examples from the Dingle Peninsula, such as those at Reask, Kilfountain, and Kilmalkedar, are perforated pillar slabs or ogham stones, ogham being the early medieval script carved in notches along stone edges. The Garfinny stone is quite different in form, and Dunne linked it more closely to comparable small holed stones he identified at Raheenyhooig and Kildrum nearby. A further example was once recorded at the early ecclesiastical site of Maumanorig, though that one has since gone missing. As for function, Dunne suggested these small stones may have been connected to rites of passage, possibly associated with beliefs around Limbo, the difficulties of childbirth, or other liminal religious practices, thresholds between one state and another where the physical world and something less tangible were thought to meet.