Bullauns are boulders or rock surfaces bearing one or more cup-shaped depressions, ground out by hand over long periods and associated in Ireland with early Christian and pre-Christian ritual use, though their precise purposes remain debated. They turn up near old church sites, holy wells, and field boundaries, often half-buried or repurposed as gatestops, and they have a habit of quietly disappearing from the record.

A pair of bullauns at Ballintombay was noted by the researcher Liam Price in 1959, each stone carrying two basins, an arrangement that is itself relatively uncommon. The two were catalogued together, but their subsequent histories diverged. One was relocated in 2005 and formally recorded. The second, however, remained elusive, its whereabouts unconfirmed in the archaeological record despite Price's original description. It was eventually photographed by Gary Hughes, who documented its present location, giving the stone at least a provisional foothold back in the record after years of absence.