What makes it particularly worth knowing about is not just the cairn itself, a mound of loose stone piled over the dead, but the detail of what was found inside: a bowl food vessel, the kind of ceramic container placed with the deceased to accompany them, suggests a ritual intention that was specific and deliberate. Thirty metres to the south-east, a granite boulder carries an incised cross and figure, an entirely different tradition pressed into the same landscape, later in date and different in faith, yet drawn to the same patch of hillside.

The cairn was first excavated in 1849, when the central cist, a small stone-lined box burial, was uncovered within a circular chamber of roughly three metres in diameter. A partially lintelled passage runs from the chamber towards the north-north-east, a feature consistent with later Bronze Age monument types. A secondary urn burial was also found within the cairn, indicating that the site was returned to for burial more than once. The monument was investigated again in 1956 as part of conservation works, and scholars including Farrington, Price, and Waddell all contributed to its interpretation over the following decades. It was placed under a preservation order under the National Monuments Acts 1930 to 2014, and subsequently taken into State Guardianship.

Tibradden Mountain is part of the Dublin Mountains and is accessible via the Tibradden Wood car park, managed by Coillte. The cairn sits above the forestry plantation, and reaching it requires a moderate uphill walk through the trees and onto open ground. The site is visible as a low, spread mound; look for the remains of the stone chamber and passage at its centre. The decorated granite boulder to the south-east is a separate recorded monument and easy to miss without knowing to look for it. The hillside can be boggy after rain, and the upper sections are exposed, so appropriate footwear is worth thinking about before setting off.