At least eighteen such inscribed stones have been recorded here, though some have since gone missing. It is an unusual density of material for a site that barely registers on most itineraries, and it speaks to a place with a considerably longer memory than its present, largely ruined state might suggest.

The site's origins are attributed to St Faithlec, reputedly a son of Fionnlugh, whose name is said to be a synonym for the pagan god Lug, which hints at the complicated layering of pre-Christian and Christian identity common to early Irish foundation myths. The early history goes unrecorded, but the community known as Cluain Tuascairt na Sinna was refounded as an Augustinian Arroasian priory, a reform congregation originating in Arrouaise in northern France, by the king of Connacht, Turlough O'Conor, after 1140. It was never a wealthy house. By 1410 it had fallen into such poverty that indulgences were issued to attract financial support. According to the antiquarian J. O'Donovan, writing in the 1830s, the coarb, meaning the hereditary successor to the founder's ecclesiastical functions, came from the O'Meehan clan and held the significant ceremonial role of inaugurating the kings of Hy Many. A 1569 inquisition found the abbey already ruinous, though the church still functioned as a parish church with an attached graveyard. Even in decline, the abbot's holdings were considerable: the town of Cloontuskert with eight cottages, Ballyleague with a castle and six cottages, 400 acres, and the churches of Kilglass, Kilgefin, and Kilteevan. A leper hospital at Erenagh was also attached to the priory at some point during its history.

The standing remains, situated on low-lying ground about 1.5 kilometres west of the River Shannon and 2.5 kilometres north of Lough Ree, include the conserved foundations of the rectangular nave, sections of the chancel wall reaching about two metres in height, and traces of the ranges that likely enclosed a cloister to the north of the church. A window of the east chancel wall, described in 1791 as lofty and grand, no longer survives. Most of the decorated and inscribed stones were recovered during a graveyard clean-up around 1990 and have since been arranged in a display enclosure near the western edge of the graveyard. Additional stones, including portions of cross-slabs, were identified more recently by Gary Dempsey around the northern stile in the graveyard wall, where the bullaun stone also sits.