It is neither. What stands here is a gabled slab shrine, popularly known as St. Cronan's grave, and its form is quietly extraordinary: two large limestone slabs lean inward toward each other, meeting at the top in the manner of a pitched roof, while triangular stones seal the east and west ends. The interior space enclosed measures roughly 1.3 metres by 0.92 metres. The southern slab is broken at its upper edge, as is the eastern endstone, lending the structure a worn, incomplete look that only adds to its antiquity.

Slab shrines of this type, where stone panels are arranged to form a miniature gabled chamber, are generally dated to the 7th century, predating the adjacent Templecronan Church by perhaps five hundred years. That church is itself of 12th century date, which means the shrine likely already had considerable age and probably sacred significance when the church was built nearby. Scholars believe these structures were designed not as primary burial monuments but to house exhumed corporeal relics, the physical remains of prominent ecclesiastics that had been deliberately disinterred and rehoused as objects of veneration. The association with St. Cronan, a figure connected to this part of Clare, fits that pattern: the saint's remains, or what were believed to be such, would have warranted exactly this kind of careful, formal enclosure. A second slab shrine lies immediately outside the graveyard to the east, suggesting this was once a site of some devotional importance rather than a solitary curiosity.