They are not inside a church, not protected by a roof, and not particularly easy to spot at first glance. What makes them quietly remarkable is precisely that displacement: sepulchral stones of some weight and intention, cut to mark specific individuals, now sitting in the open grass at some remove from the building they were presumably connected with.

The nunnery at Gracedieu was a house of Augustinian canonesses, and these two graveslabs belong to its final active century. One lies approximately twenty metres to the north of the remains, the other around six metres to the west. The northern slab is substantial, measuring around 1.6 metres long, 0.85 metres wide, and 0.45 metres thick, and it retains a worn inscription running around its margin, though the text has been eroded to the point where reading it requires patience and good light. The western slab carries a more legible decorative scheme: an incised cross, that is, a cross cut directly into the stone surface rather than carved in relief, with a stepped base and floriated arms, meaning the ends of the cross branch into stylised leaf or flower forms. This kind of cross design was common on late medieval Irish grave markers and connects these slabs to a broader tradition of ecclesiastical commemoration across the island during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

Gracedieu is located in the Fingal area of north County Dublin, and the nunnery ruins themselves are the main reference point for finding the slabs. Because the stones lie in open ground rather than inside any enclosure, their condition is exposed to the elements and the inscriptions will only become harder to read with time. The northern slab in particular rewards close inspection at a low angle, where raking light can help pick out the remaining letterforms around the edge. Visiting in low winter sun, or in the early morning, gives the best chance of making sense of what survives.