This distinction matters. Rather than being erected or placed, it was revealed, cut directly from the natural substrate of the crag, leaving a form that is inseparable from the ground it inhabits. It stands just over a metre tall and less than half a metre wide, rough in finish rather than dressed or decorative, and sits close to the eastern flight of steps that pilgrims and monks would have climbed to reach the monastery above.

Skellig Michael, a steep pyramidal rock rising from the Atlantic some twelve kilometres off the Kerry coast, was home to a monastic community from at least the sixth or seventh century. The monks who settled there carved and constructed their way across the near-vertical terrain, creating a network of stone stairways, terraces, and dry-stone cells, including the distinctive beehive-shaped structures, called clocháns, that survive at the summit. Crosses of various kinds were placed, carved, or inscribed across the site as part of this devotional landscape, and this particular example sits just to the north-west of another cross nearby, suggesting a cluster of such markers close to the eastern approach. The measurements recorded by archaeologists A. O'Sullivan and J. Sheehan in their 1996 survey of the Iveragh Peninsula place it at 1.03 metres high, 0.47 metres wide, and 0.12 metres thick, dimensions modest enough to feel like a waymarker rather than a monument.

Access to Skellig Michael is by licensed boat from ports including Portmagee and Ballinskelligs, and landings depend heavily on weather conditions, which can be severe even in summer. The eastern steps, near which this cross stands, form part of the principal route up through the site, so visitors following that ascent are likely to pass it without necessarily knowing what to look for. It rewards a slow approach.